Speak Now
by skygirl55
Summary: Richard Castle has it all: fame, fortune, and Kate Beckett, the best friend anyone could ask for. Yet, when they're separated by her job abroad, Castle realizes he wants to turn their friendship into more. Before he can tell her, she returns...with her fiance. He's determined to stop the wedding, but will he be able before they say 'I do' (AU based on the movie Made of Honor)
1. Chapter 1

_Richard Castle has it all: fame, fortune, and Kate Beckett, the best friend anyone could ask for. Yet, when they're separated by her job abroad, Castle realizes he wants to turn their friendship into more. Before he can tell her, she returns...with her fiance. He's determined to stop the wedding, but will he be able before they say 'I do'? (Rom-com fic based on the movie Made of Honor) _

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_A/N: I love the movie Made of Honor \- I love it so much. I remember when I first saw It my only thought was "this feels like a fic I would have written" so I was all too happy with Alex's list of rom-com prompts. I hope you enjoy it as well._

 _Updates will be Saturdays and Tuesdays. There are 16 chapters + an epilogue - AND a sequel :)_

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 **Chapter One**

Richard Castle stepped inside _Ruby's on Fourth_ , plucked the sunglasses from his face, and inhaled deeply the scent of the classic diner atmosphere. Ah, finally; he was home.

He didn't suppose _Ruby's_ had changed much in its forty-six year tenure. The tables and chairs were weathered and rickety after nearly five decades of patrons sliding in and out. The flooring was well-worn and cracking in the higher traffic areas. And, judging by its ever-yellowing tone, the wallpaper most certainly had not been changed in any recent decade, but none of that mattered. The atmosphere of _Ruby's_ merely added to the charm and Castle didn't mind that one bit.

"Well, well, look who it is." _Ruby's_ most loyal employee smiled up at the large-framed man as he walked through the door. She sat on her usual stool by the entrance, stack of menus on the kiosk beside her. Sister of the diner's namesake, Denise had been a waitress since the day the doors opened, but eighteen months earlier—after her second knee replacement—she'd been unable to keep up with the fast pace and heavy loads required of a server. Instead, she stuck by the door greeting each patron and giving special treatment to her favorites.

"Denise, darling." Castle flashed a grin to the white-haired, round-faced woman. "You look lovelier every time I see you."

She let out a giggle not unlike those heard from girls one quarter her age. "Stop it Ricky! You're such a tease!"

"Never!" He proclaimed, a cheeky grin displayed across his face.

"Your usual table for two?"

Castle bobbed his head in conformation. "She didn't beat me here, did she?"

"Not this morning," Denise said. Then, after plucking two menus from her stack, she directed Castle towards his preferred spot: the two-seater dead center in the diner's front window. The hostess knew the loyal customers well; people watching while eating their brunch was most definitely a shared guilty-pleasure.

Castle took the menus, thanked the elder woman, and began tip-toeing his way through the occupied tables and chairs of already crowded diner. Just as he reached their table, the mixed scent of industrial-strength coffee and greasy bacon wafted beneath his nostrils. He breathed in deep and shut his eyes with pleasure; yes, he had missed this—even if it had only been two weeks.

For Castle, Sunday brunch was not Sunday brunch unless it was at _Ruby's_. He and his brunch companion had probably tried dozens if not well over a hundred eating establishments in Manhattan and the surrounding boroughs during their near decade of brunching together. Some were horrible. Some had good food but a terrible atmosphere. For others, the opposite was true. They'd tried food carts, high-end eating establishments and everything in between, but they continually returned to _Ruby's_.

Castle slid into the seat facing the door so he could watch for his friend. Out of pure habit, he picked up the menu and skimmed his eyes down the page. Truly, there was no reason to do this. He probably knew the menu at _Ruby's_ better than half the waitresses, but there was always the chance something new might appear (though, if his memory served him right, it had been at least two years since anything new had been added—at least, to the breakfast menu).

Not three minutes after he sat down, Castle's attention was drawn immediately to the door when a stunning brunette stepped in. She adjusted the purse strap on her shoulder, nodded a polite "Good Morning" to Denise and then scanned her eyes towards their usual spot. Her eyes fell on him and a smile immediately spread across her face.

Castle let out a slow exhale as he stood to greet her. Just the sight of her made everything better. Hazel eyes and cheek bones that could be seen from a mile away. Hair that usually fell in soft curls, but at that moment was knotted in a messy bun near the crown of her head. Pale skin dotted with gentle hints of freckles. But, for Richard Castle, the feature he most admired—the feature he showed up every Sunday morning promptly at ten thirty a.m. for—was her smile. Kate Beckett's smile disarmed him each and every time he saw it and, a decade after their first meeting, he doubted that would soon change.

"Kate, darling, you're looking particularly lovely this morning." Castle swooped in and planted a kiss on her cheek before gesturing for her to sit across from him. "Is that a new coat?"

Kate set her purse on the floor and unbuttoned the jacket before arching one eyebrow at her friend. "Okay," she said, plopping down on the seat. "Spill it."

He sat back down and gazed at her delicately, his expression oozing innocence and charm. "Spill what?"

She folded her hands together and rested her knuckles against the table. "You want something, Castle; I know it. You only compliment me like this when you want something." She was no fool. In ten years, she'd come to learn each and every trick Richard Castle had tucked up his lengthy sleeves. Of course, she'd had him figured out in less than half that time, but the added years gave her the benefit of a highly sensitive bullshit meter and right now it read off the charts.

Castle faked a gasp and placed his right hand over his heart. "I am offended by such an accusation! But…now that you mention it…" He smiled and leaned in towards her. "I do need a date to my mother's wedding."

"No," she said simply. Then, she picked up the menu before her and studied it as though she would later be quizzed on the exact font sizes and styles used on each different menu item.

"Kaaaaate." The man whined in a tone far too childish for his age.

Kate pushed her menu down against the table in one swift move. "No, Castle; no way."

"What? C'mon—she loves you!"

"And I love her," Kate continued. "But after the circus fiasco from two years ago I vowed never again."

Castle skimmed his fingertips against his chin at the memory of his mother's prior nuptials. Unfortunately, Kate's descriptor of "circus" was not one of exaggeration. "Who knew elephants could stampede a buffet table like that, right?"

"Castle!"

He chuckled. "C'mon, Kate; it wasn't that bad."

She let out a squeak of indignation. "That bad! That bad!? There was a nude trapeze artist, Castle—nude!"

A smirk crossed his face as he shut his eyes in memory of the flexible young woman's high-flying act. "Yeah, she was hot wasn't she? Ah!" He yelped and his eyes popped open when his companion's foot came in swift contact with his shin.

Grumbling at her, he continued. "Kate, I swear there are no clothing-optional entertainers this time. It's going to be a low-key affair. At least, compared to last time…" As a skeptical expression remained on Kate's face, Castle reached across the narrow table and snagged her right hand before she had a chance to snatch it away. Pulling it close to him, he turned to begging. "Please Kate? Please? If you come with me I promise I'll be your best friend forever."

Kate rolled her eyes at this. "I think I'm stuck with you forever regardless."

He grinned at this true statement before his groveling continued. Flipping her hand over in his grasp, he peppered her palm and wrist with kisses in-between begs. "Please Kate? Please, please, please!"

"Okay, god, fine," she grunted, yanking her hand back and wiping the palm against her jeans. "I'll go with you just don't get your slobber all over my new coat!"

The smile across Castle's face could not have been prouder. "I owe you, Kate. Really."

She waved her hand casually at him indicating it was no big deal. As she did so, their waitress showed up, pouring them each a large cup of black coffee (the extra-black diner kind that, as Castle described it, would put hair on anyone's chest—man or woman) and offered to take their orders.

Their ritual dated back nearly to the beginning of their brunches together, though neither of them quite knew how it started. Whenever they tried a new restaurant the task became a bit more interesting, but at _Ruby's_ their orders were almost always the same: two eggs over easy, hash browns and white toast. The only difference was that one chose bacon and the other sausage so they could have a little of each breakfast meat.

Once their order was placed, Kate stood from her seat and shrugged off her jacket before sitting back down. Though overnight a spring rain had fallen lowering the temperature to the low-fifties, the springtime sun beating through the diner's glass window had warmed the restaurant nicely. "So your mom's really marrying Chet, huh?"

Castle shrugged as he set down his coffee mug. "So it would appear."

Kate dumped two sugar packets into her coffee mug before taking a tentative sip, scrunching her nose, and adding two more. "I thought she'd sworn off marriage after _the magician_ ," Kate said, emphasizing the profession of Castle's prior step-father. To be honest, she did not remember the man's name, though she remembered his occupation quite clearly. Being a magician in a traveling circus was a unique enough job that she would have remembered regardless, however that particular gentleman had the irritating habit of working the fact that he was _a magician_ into every conversation no less than eighty times.

"You know her—that lasted all of five minutes. At least this time they're doing it right—and by right I mean with a pre-nup."

Kate smirked at this. "Really? I didn't think she had any money left to steal." While she believed his card tricks to be elementary at best, the former Mr. Martha Rodgers had pulled the greatest magic act she'd ever seen: making the balance of Castle's mother's bank account vanish into thin air.

Castle leaned back in his seat with a sigh. "That would be funny if it weren't true—but no, it's Chet's idea. He's protecting his assets. Mother threw a dramatic fit about it, but ultimately she agreed."

"Romantic."

"It will be once she moves out of my loft," Castle told her with a poisonous smile. He loved his mother, truly he did; he just loved her more from afar. And he loved her much, much more when her incredibly poor decisions did not directly affect his cushy, bachelor existence. Did he feel bad that all of her money had been stolen by a man who served her with divorce papers from his new residence in the Cayman Islands? Sure. But he would have felt more sympathy towards her had she not married him four weeks after meeting him and had that marriage not taken place inside the third ring at a literal three ring circus.

Once their meals arrived and Kate swapped two of her sausage links for one of his strips of bacon, she asked, "So when's the big day?"

"Two weeks. She's trying to snag him before he sees the real Martha Rodgers…or before he dies of a heart attack; whichever comes sooner."

"Castle!"

"What?" He shrugged off his companion's scolding tone. "He's had two already—that's a valid concern."

She gave a conceding nod. "Especially since your mother is a tiger in the bedroom."

Castle felt his stomach lurch in his gut. He shut his eyes tightly and gulped. "Kate…"

She giggled, knowing full well the only thing Castle hated more than talking about his mother's marriages (Chet would be her fourth husband) was discussing her bedroom habits. Much to the chagrin of everyone around her, Martha was never too shy to discuss those. "Sorry, but that was for getting your drool on my jacket."

After shooting her a pointed look, Castle turned back to his breakfast. "So you wanna take my Black Card to go and get yourself a new dress."

Kate glanced up at her famous mystery writer friend; rarely did he miss an opportunity to mention the fact that he possessed one of the oh-so-elite AMEX Black Cards. "No, because unlike you I don't spend money like it's water."

"Hey," he said, stabbing his fork in her direction. "I needed each and every one of those light sabers."

"I'm sure." They exchanged smiles before Kate continued. "I have something I can wear."

"Really? Because you know this is the social event of the season!" Though he added an extra dramatic flair to the statement, Castle had heard his mother use a phrase similar to that one when describing her upcoming nuptials. "You know Mother will shame you if you wear something she's seen before."

Kate pressed her lips tightly together in recollection of the events Rodgers-Castle family Christmas party from two years earlier. She _still_ heard about the two holidays in a row she wore the exact same dress. "Valid point."

He beamed at her. "Shopping it is then! You doing anything after this?"

Kate let out a snort. "I do have a life, you know."

"Do you?"

"Castle."

He laughed under her glare. "Just kidding—you are a very important, very busy professor and you are on the brink of sanity because it's almost the end of the semester and soon you're going to have ten thousand papers to read and grade."

Kate smiled, proud that after several years of impressing upon him just how ridiculous the end of the semester could be he was finally beginning to understand. "Exactly."

A wide grin crossed his face. "See, Kate—I know you better than you know yourself."

Kate rolled her eyes and turned back to her hash browns, though when she lowered her chin a small smile did creep onto her face. Did he know her better than she knew herself? Kate didn't think so, but she could not deny there were some days he got pretty damn close.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

Walking towards the ballrooms at the Waldorf Astoria in Manhattan, Kate Beckett paused to examine her reflection. Smoothing down the navy-colored skirt of her sleeveless gown with a high neck that plunged to a V in the back, Kate shook her head. It was not every day she wore a dress that cost nearly a thousand dollars, but then again it was not every day she attended a wedding at one of the most prestigious hotels in the city. Leave it to Martha Rodgers to procure such a venue on short notice (though the fact that the wedding was on a Monday night did help significantly, Kate imagined). After tucking an escaped strand of hair back behind her ear, Kate continued on her way towards the ballroom.

Ever since he'd acquired the elite rectangle of plastic years earlier, Castle had never been shy about offering his Black Card around at every presented opportunity. Many of their friends leapt at the chance to partake in several hundred dollar bottles of champagne and first class tickets to Las Vegas. Back in the earlier years of their friendship, Kate felt a certain amount of guilt when Castle paid for things she could have easily purchased herself. She believed that just because he had money did not mean she needed to take advantage of him. After all, she was not friends with him solely because of his wealth. When she accepted something elaborate from him she always felt a certain amount of guilt and thus did so only on rare occasion.

Somewhere around the sixth year of their friendship, however, those guilty feelings began to expire. She never took advantage and often requested they receive separate checks when dining together, but when he invited her to an event—such as his mother's wedding—and offered to buy her a dress without being prompted or hinted at to do so? Well, she wasn't going to feel guilty about that.

"Yo Kate—wait up!"

Kate turned her head to see a familiar, well-dressed trio approaching and her face relaxed into a smile. The group encompassed her closest circle of friends: Kevin Ryan, his wife Jenny, and Javier Esposito, who preferred to attend events stag ever since his divorce the prior year.

"Don't you guys clean up well?" Kate greeted all three of them with cheek kisses.

When discussing their plans for the event, Castle had not specifically mentioned who would be in attendance at the wedding. He merely told her the date, time and location, stating she would need to meet him there because, as son of the bride, he had wedding duties and thus needed to arrive at the venue extra early. Though she suspected they might be attending, Kate was certainly glad to see her friends. At least she would have someone to sit with while Castle preformed his usher duties.

"Your dress is beautiful, Kate," Jenny said.

Kate smiled and thanked her before adding, "Apparently I wasn't allowed to wear something I already owned—Martha's rules."

"Well now you have something to wear until the next wedding," Esposito observed.

Kate smacked his shoulder with the back of her hand. "Don't say that! They're not even married yet."

Esposito shrugged. "You know I love the woman—she's like a second mother to me—but let's be honest: Martha Rodgers is not very good at marriage. I give this one eighteen months—tops. Wanna make it interesting?" He questioned, wiggling his eyebrows enticingly at his friends.

Kevin considered this. "Alright, but I bet Castle wants in on it too. Let's go find him!"

Kate merely sighed and shook her head as they hurried off leaving the women trailing behind. She wasn't sure what was sadder: the fact that they were betting on the duration of the impending nuptials or the fact that she wasn't even surprised they were doing it. She had, after all, known the boys equally as long as she'd known her date for that evening.

The unlikely bond between the three men and woman began a decade earlier while they attended college in the city. She, a junior, studied at Colombia while the boys, all seniors, attended NYU. One evening during a party in the Colombia dorms, the NYU boys crashed. During an attempt to drunkenly hook up with her roommate at the time, Castle had mistakenly crawled into Kate's bed. Startled awake by a strange man's hands groping her, Kate had responded by spraying him in the face with mace, an act that sent him screaming from the room. Days later, she bumped into him again, that time with his two cronies, and, somewhat inexplicably, the quartet had been friends ever since.

Over the years, not much had changed. They graduated, got jobs, and blossomed into adulthood, but their friendship remained. They still went to Mets games together or watched them as a group on Castle's big screen. They spent summer weekends at the writer's house in the Hamptons, grilling out and drinking beer on the beach. Kevin and Javier found wives. Castle's notoriety as a writer grew. Yet somehow, things between the four of them remained steady and it was one of the things Kate was most grateful for.

Arriving at the entrance to the ballroom, Kate spotted the trio of boys whispering to each other and fought the urge to roll her eyes. Just as they were shaking hands, presumably having agreed upon terms to their bet, she stepped up beside them and cleared her throat. The three of them jumped as they always did when "Mom" caught them and scattered apart in the blink of an eye. The only remaining member of the group—a tuxedo wearing, guilty looking writer—beamed at her.

"Kate," he began in his smoothest tone. "You look stunning."

She ignored the compliment and merely folded her arms over her chest, biting her bottom lip as she shook her head. "Betting on your mother's wedding…" She didn't bother to mask the judgmental nature of her tone, knowing full well he'd take it in stride.

As predicted, he shrugged and opened his arms palms facing her as if to say, "Well, you know me." And know him she did. Honestly, it would have been odd if the evening didn't end in some sort of wager.

"You do look beautiful," he said after dropping his hands to his sides.

A gentle smile crossed her face and she dropped her eye line. "Well, you don't look so bad yourself." She had seen him in a tuxedo many times, of course, but never tired of it.

"Hey you know me—I'm no stranger to one of these penguin suits."

A breathy chuckle escaped her lips before a smirk crossed her face as she looked at him. "Yeah, but I'm not used to seeing you in one without at least one blonde, large-breasted accessory."

Keeping up with her teasing, he widened his eyes and patted down the pockets of his jacket and then his pants as though he'd suddenly remembered losing his phone or keys. "I thought something was missing!"

"Ha-ha." She returned dryly. She knew full well that Castle's tuxedo accessory as of late had been a brunette Columbia literature professor and not a bottle blonde with an augmented chest. For a regular night on the town the blonde was preferred, but not for special events—that went against his rules.

Continuing the joke, Castle said, "Yeah, but think of it this way—you already know the answer to the 'will he take me home with him' question."

She laughed genuinely that time for the notion was preposterous. "Yeah—a big fat 'no!'"

He merely shrugged. "Offer's always there, Kate."

"And yet." She pretended to be deep in thought, skimming her index finger over her chin. "Somehow…I think I'll be able to resist." Ten years of friendship and the concept of being another notch on his bedpost had no more appeal then than it had a decade earlier.

He waggled a finger at her. "One day, Kate; one day…."

With that, she rolled her eyes, hiked up her skirt, and climbed the stairs leading into the ballroom.

* * *

Two hours later after a short-and-sweet ceremony, a cocktail hour featuring a loud argument between the groom's eldest and youngest son's, and a sinfully delicious dinner, Kate sat alone at a round table of eight sipping wine and casually observing the dancefloor. Javier had left in search of single women under fifty to hit on. Kevin and Jenny had hit the dance floor and asked her to join, but she didn't feel up to "busting a move" quite yet; she needed more wine for that.

She didn't mind sitting alone, truly. She enjoyed people watching, particularly when alcohol and DJs were involved (or, in this case, a surprisingly decent wedding band). Sitting back and watching wedding receptions seemed so common as of late it was practically a hobby.

Attending wedding after wedding after bridal shower after wedding seemed to be a simple factor of her age. At twenty-nine over half her friends and coworkers were married, a large percentage of the rest engaged. She didn't mind being one of the few not only not engaged, but not in a serious relationship either. She had chosen a career over relationships and, as she had obtained her doctorate the year earlier, did not regret the decision one bit. She didn't even mind attending most of the weddings alone (though, did occasionally drag Castle along as her plus-one just so she had someone to talk to.) Still, part of her wondered when her turn might come.

Just as she watched Ryan and Jenny perform a particularly skillful move on the dance floor, a hand descended in front of her face, palm up, fingers together. "M'lady."

Kate gazed up skeptically at her alleged date for the evening. She had yet to speak more than three words to him since their conversation before the ceremony. "And here I thought you ditched me."

"Never." He beamed at her. "Care to dance?"

She sighed and swallowed the last of her wine. "If I must."

"Of course you must!" Castle grabbed her hand and pulled her towards the center of the floor just as—mercifully—a slower song began to play.

"So where have you been?"

"Everywhere," he sighed. "Both of Chet's boys left after their rumble by the cheese platter-"

"Yeah what was that about anyway?" Kate questioned. Unfortunately she had been in the ladies' room when the brawl occurred and had to hear about it second hand from Jenny.

"Not entirely certain to be honest. I know those two historically have not gotten along, so I think it was just a continuation of a preexisting dispute," he explained. Kate nodded and then he continued. "Anyway, with them gone I had to make sure things at the reception were going smoothly but now that they're prepping the cake to cut my duties are pretty much over."

"You're such a good son," Kate said, patting his cheek patronizingly.

He rolled his eyes. "Oh yeah, I'm…something."

They continued to sway for the remainder of the song, but when it ended Kate walked back towards their table. He protested, saying that as his date she was required to give him no less than three dances. After shooting him an annoyed look, she agreed to dance later, but wanted some place quiet to tell him something before she forgot. "It's actually…kind of exciting," she confessed with a laugh.

He raised his eyebrows with intrigue. "Do tell!"

"Did I tell you how I applied to teach that summer course and I wasn't sure if I would get accepted?"

Castle turned his eyes towards the ceiling and thought for a moment. "This sounds vaguely familiar, yes."

She beamed at him. "Well, I got it!"

"Oh Kate that's amazing! Congrats!" He pulled her in and kissed her cheek.

She laughed and squeezed his arm in return. "Thanks! Six weeks in England—I can't believe it! I know I've been there before but-"

"Hang on." Castle interrupted when the key location in her sentence processed in his brain. "England?"

She twisted her lips to the side, giving him her classic "I knew you weren't listening" expression. "The summer course is at Oxford—I told you that."

He shook his head slowly. "No…" He definitely would have remembered if she said she was leaving the country.

"Well, it is. I leave almost right after the semester is over so I really need to-"

"Six weeks…six weeks…" He interrupted again as his brain processed this new information. "But…you'll miss all that time out in the Hamptons!"

She laughed gently. "Castle, the summer is longer than six weeks."

"But you'll miss my big Fourth of July bash!"

At the whine in his tone, Kate folded her arms over her chest. Yes, Castle's Fourth of July bash was a decade-long tradition, and it was a shame she had to miss it, but the opportunity far outweighed that one event. To have a summer at Oxford on her CV…well, that would open up greater opportunities for her professionally, and that was exactly what she was looking for. She only hoped her friend could see that. "This is something I really want to do, Rick," she said. Using his first name was a rarity, but she did so in an attempt to drive home the point; it worked.

Castle's face fell into one of sincerity and he brought his hands up to rest on her shoulders. "I know; of course it is. I'm sorry. This is a great opportunity for you." He forced a smile, but when her expression mirrored his he felt a twinge of sadness shoot directly through his heart.

Six weeks without Kate? Six weeks without Sunday brunch and coffee breaks and reading together in white wooden chairs on the deck at his beach house? So much for looking forward to the start of summer… "I'm just going to miss you; that's all."

Her head tilted to the side as she looked at him. This was the Richard Castle she was going to miss. Not the playboy idiot with a blonde on each arm. Not the overgrown child who placed bets on the duration of his mother's marriage. Not the crazy writer who called her at all hours of the night to see if a snippet of dialog made sense in a scene. No—the kind, caring devoted friend; that was the man she would miss. "I'll miss you too, Castle, but really six weeks is going to fly by."

He nodded, grabbed her hand and pulled her back towards the dance floor. "You're right, it will…but because you're leaving I get your piece of cake tonight."

"No way!" She retorted. Was he insane? Wedding cake was the best part of weddings!

"Half your piece, then."

She sighed, knowing he'd just steal it if she didn't agree. "Fine—but I get to pick what half!"

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 _A/N: wow! over 110 followers after just 1 chapter! Thanks guys!_

 _Just one to address something I saw in the comments - The question was raised as to how Castle could possibly not know about his best friend being engaged/dating someone. I agree-totally valid question-but as I'm sticking closely to the movie plot in that instance...you'll have to wait and see :)_


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

Richard Castle was absolutely, positively, utterly miserable.

Four weeks, three days and seven hours had passed since he'd seen his best friend and he was practically beside himself. Going without seeing her was one thing, but without seeing her _or_ being able to talk to her? Torture!

After the goodbye party he insisted on throwing her, Kate jetted off to London. She had promised to email him when she landed, and did so, though the message was brief stating that she had arrived and was exhausted. A few days later she had emailed him to say that she was excited to start the summer course and the place she was staying was nice, but other than that she did not provide much detail.

Before leaving, Kate explained to Castle that she would not be purchasing an international cell phone plan so they would be unable to call or text for the duration of her trip. Castle offered to pay for the plan for her, but she refused stating they would survive with just email communication. It was, after all, only six weeks.

Castle agreed to this (albeit reluctantly) because he thought that meant they would actually be emailing. Specifically: that she would be emailing him at least half as much as he emailed her, but this was not the case; not in the least.

After the two initial emails, he received one more on her first day of class saying that it had gone well and her students seemed like a good group, but that was the end her communication. Despite the fact that he sent her at least two or three emails a day to keep her updated on the happenings in Manhattan or just random stream-of-conscious emails (these typically happened late at night) she did not respond to him for over two weeks. Finally, he sent her a message with liberal exclamation point usage typed in all capital letters demanding reassurance that she was, in fact, alive. Thankfully, this elicited a response from her, though it was far less than what he'd hoped: _Relax. I'm not dead, just busy._

With only one other, one-sentence email from her in the two weeks since that Castle found himself at a near standstill with agony. He slept poorly, ate at only sporadic intervals, and hadn't written a decent sentence let alone paragraph or chapter for his latest novel since his best friend had hopped across the pond. To his own surprise, he'd also given up dating entirely, one of his self-proclaimed favorite pastimes.

To put it simply: Richard Castle loved being in the company of beautiful women. He found them interesting and unique and wonderful distractions for things he should have been doing (like writing). For most of his life he'd bounced from one short-term relationship to another. The one and only time he had been in a long-term relationship (an ill-advised love affair with his publisher at the time) it had blown up in his face. Since then, he'd adhered to self-imposed strict dating guidelines.

He did not date one woman for more than three months. He did not go on dates with the same woman multiple nights in a row. He did not invite any of these women to significant personal or family events nor did he agree to be a date to one of their family events.

To date, those rules had kept him happy, carefree, and blissfully unattached. At least, for the long term. Why did he need something long term with a perfectly nice, yet entirely imperfect when it came down to it, woman when he had Kate?

That's when it hit him: sitting on his couch watching ESPN ignoring yet another phone call from his paramour of the previous months. The answer to almost every critical question in his life was Kate.

If he needed advise about his book, his life, his mother—anything—he would ask Kate. If he needed a date to his mother's wedding or his publisher's annual bash, who did he ask? Kate. If his mother turned up on his doorstep penniless with mascara staining her cheeks who did he call? Well, first the police, but then Kate.

Kate!

He had been such a fool! For weeks he had sulked around his apartment, grumbling and groaning, not realizing why he had a continuing throbbing sensation in his gut. He missed her, yes, but he missed her more than he would have missed Javier or Kevin if they went away. He missed her laugh and her smile on a deep, molecular level, and when she returned he didn't want just his brunch buddy back he wanted her—all of her.

And that was…well, interesting.

When it came to Kate, Castle's feelings had historically been complicated at best. The first night they met, when he'd drunkenly slipped into her bed thinking she was someone else, and, like a moron, had slid his meaty hand beneath her pajama top—a move that earned him the searing agony of pepper spray to the face—he hadn't exactly remembered her. It was dark and she was a blur of limbs and blankets. Plus, there was the literal blinding pain he suffered. It was only her voice that stuck with him. The scream was piercing, but there was something intriguing, powerful, and hilarious about the way she told him to get the fuck out of her room.

It was that voice he recognized weeks later when they bumped into each other again. He sheepishly confessed to being her two a.m. accidental groper and offered to apologize to her by way of taking her to dinner. She'd rolled her eyes and refused, which made him even more determined to make things right with her. His persistence paid off and she agreed to a coffee date so that he would—quote—finally leave her the hell alone.

Coffee turned to conversation, their mutual love of the Mets came up, and, somehow, the next week she attended a game with him, Javier and Kevin. From that first game, they'd foraged and unexpected yet remarkable friendship that Castle knew he would be lost without.

Upon second sight of her—when she wasn't hitting him and spraying him with a stringent liquid—he was rendered near mute by her beauty. The more he got to know her, the more captivated he became, but the more he got to know her, the more he realized she had absolutely no interest in him. Castle liked to think of himself as being a pretty decent reader of the opposite sex (a skill he believed he acquired from being raised by a single mother), but he never needed those skills with Kate; her hostility towards him was, at times, painfully apparent.

Back then, he couldn't blame her. He was fresh off the wild success that came from his first publish novel. He was cocky and, quite frankly, a bit of an asshole. As he grew older he was still occasionally cocky, but only an asshole when he wanted to be. By thirty, he knew that he was his real self around few people; she was one of them.

The more he thought about it, Castle knew he was unquestionably ready to take their friendship to a romantic level, and felt Kate would be open to the idea as well. True, she might need a bit of convincing, but he was up to the challenge.

Upon arriving at his mid-week basketball game with the guys, Castle decided he would run the idea of Castle-and-Kate by them to gauge their reactions. Typically, Kate was his go-to person for a second opinion, but obviously that would not work in this case both because the advice was about her and because she was out of the country. Though, seeing as they had known Kate equally as long, Javier and Kevin were the most qualified to provide opinions on the subject.

Though when they met at the gym at seven p.m. they always intended on finding a fourth to play a two-on-two match, they were rarely successful and thus typically ended up playing an ever shifting game of two-on-one, but their teams never mattered. They didn't keep score; they did it for the exercise, the bonding time, and, mostly, the tradition.

"So, ah," Castle began, taking a shot from the three point line only to have it ricochet off the rim and fly off in the opposite direction. "I'm thinking when Kate gets back I'm probably gonna ask her out."

"Finally!" Kevin proclaimed as he scooped the ball up from the court. Oppositely, a slack-jawed Javier proclaimed, "No you can't!"

Castle blinked at him. "What? Why can't I?"

Javier snagged the ball from Kevin's limp grasp and dribbled it aggressively. "Because if you sleep with her it'll throw off our whole…" He gestured wildly with his non-dribbling hand. "…thing."

Castle stole the ball mid-dribble and made a shot from closer to the basket. After sinking it he turned and asked, "What does that even mean?"

"It means Kate's our girl, right? She hangs out with us, goes to Mets games with us…it's like she's one of the guys, except she makes us food."

Castle thought dreamily for a moment about Kate's sinfully good buffalo dip and barbeque chicken quesadillas. God, she was a fantastic cook—when she took the time (her words, not his). Yet another reason their relationship was a great idea! "Right…"

"But if you sleep with her then you'll mess all that up. You can't just screw her and not call her bro—she'll kill you for that. And I mean that literally," Javier added with a pointed look.

Castle shook his head. Though his friend made a valid point about Kate's razor sharp talons, he had zero intentions to sleep with Kate and then not call her. In fact, those were the _opposite_ of his intentions. Kate was not a girl he planned on cutting off at the three month mark like all the others. She was different—completely and one hundred percent different. "I know that, and that's not an issue. I mean, I'm serious about her."

Javier eyed him skeptically so he continued. "I mean it. I don't want to sleep with her—I want to, you know, date her."

"Date her. You, Richard Castle, infamous playboy, with a steady girlfriend?" Javier's tone indicated the Castle had informed them all he was planning on dressing exclusively in drag from that point forward.

"What's wrong with that?"

"Nothing, Castle," Kevin promised. "I think it's a great idea."

"You would," Javier returned in a snippy tone that made Castle's smile short lived. Then, turning to his writer friend, he continued. "Castle, listen to me, you don't want to do this."

Castle pressed his lips together. He'd been thinking about it for days, and thus far he'd only come up with reasons for the "pro" column and had not thought of one single "con." "And why not? Kate's a great girl."

"Oh she's fantastic—love her to death," Javier promised. "I'm saying _you_ don't want to do that. You're a lone wolf—like me. You can't be tied down."

Kevin rolled his eyes and took a shot at the basket. "Please. You're just bitter because your wife left you for that surgeon."

"This has nothing to do with Lanie!" Javier responded a bit too sharply in a tone several notches higher than his usual one. Clearing his throat, he took a calmer approach with his next statement. "This has to do with Ricky boy here—settling down."

Castle shrugged. "Maybe that's what I want. Maybe I want what Kev and Jenny have. They seem happy."

Kevin smiled dreamily. "We are."

Javier practically gagged. "Dude? Really? Marriage?"

Castle shrugged one shoulder casually. Okay, when thinking about dating Kate, he had not specifically thought about marrying her. Clearly, it was far too soon for that. They needed to at least date a little bit before that. Hell, they'd never even kissed! However, he was not fundamentally opposed to marriage, and what was that thing people always said? The best marriages started as friendships. If that really was true, he and Kate had certainly started on the right path.

"I'm not saying I'm going to propose to Kate on our first date I'm just saying... I'm open to the idea and Kate seems like the kind of girl I could make that work with. Hence, I want to date her. You...you guys think she'll go out with me, right?" The fact that she might say no was not a factor in his grand plan, but the concept did flip his stomach in his gut. Luckily, his friends were quick to assuage his fears.

"Absolutely," Kevin said.

"Even I have to agree with that." Javier nodded. "Really...if she's stuck around this long, what are the odds of you scaring her away now? She's seen you at your lowest—and I do mean low, bro."

Castle's brow wrinkled. He could not think of any recent debauchery that Kate had witnessed. "What are you talking about?"

"Vegas...those two strippers."

Feeling his cheeks begin to heat at the memory of _that_ night, Castle combed his fingers through his hair. "Oh...right...yeah let's not bring that up, shall we?"

"She's seriously going to say yes," Kevin promised. "In fact, why don't you email her right now and ask?"

"Nah," Castle shook his head. "Gotta do it in person. Plus, she'll be home in two weeks. I'll just…take her to dinner when she's back." Yes, yes that was perfect, he decided. Taking her out to dinner, letting her gush about her trip and then asking her to go out with him, that way her inaugural meal back would be their unofficial first date and he absolutely couldn't wait.


	4. Chapter 4

_A/n: Just wanted to touch briefly on the comments about Kate's feelings for Castle/their friendship due to the lack of communication. This is, in part, taken from the movie, where the guy and girl have little communication during their separation. It's funny, though, because I didn't find it that odd. Back in college, my best friend spent a semester in England and I heard from her about once every three weeks. Now, admittedly, I'm a "Castle" aka I will email you 2-3 times a day every day about random shit, but still I didn't find it odd because of that experience. (For those interested: it's been 8 years, I still email her at least 2-3 times as much as she emails me - some things never change lol)_

* * *

 **Chapter Four**

This was it; this was the night. This was the night that Richard Castle's life changed forever. As a professional writer, he considered setting an appropriate scene to be high on his list of skills and he was happy to say that what he created on paper easily translated to reality.

First, they would meet at a swanky, sexy piano bar he knew Kate enjoyed. They would have drinks and he would listen attentively to all the details of her trip. Then, shortly before eight, a town car would pick them up and whisk them off to their reservation at one of the best French restaurants in the city. There, a private table adorned with two dozen roses and fancy champagne awaited them. At that point, when she was presumably stunned by his gesture, he would casually suggest that she think of the evening as a real date. When she undoubtedly agreed, he would nudge the subject a little further during their meal and, hopefully, if all went according to plan, the night would end in their first real kiss. It was going to be perfect!

Castle arrived at the bar almost twenty minutes early just to assure he beat her there. He wanted a chance to settle in, perhaps have a drink to calm his nerves. Nerves! Him! Richard Castle! The last time he was nervous going out with a woman, he'd been seventeen, but that night—with such potential for so much more—butterflies filled his gut.

For the prior two weeks, Castle could think of little else than what exactly he would say to Kate when she arrived back in Manhattan. He wrote out nearly a dozen different variations of speeches before he settled on words that made sense. At first, he started elaborately with flowery prose peppering her with compliments, but in the end he decided to just be honest with her. He would tell her that in her absence he'd realized just how much he missed her, how much he enjoyed her presence in his day-to-day life and maybe after ten years it was time they took their relationship to a more romantic level.

The concept of having a real, steady girlfriend was certainly a contributing factor in his nerves. The last time he had someone in his life he would have called a girlfriend was over seven years earlier, when he was in a relationship with his publisher, Gina Cowell. As far as relationships went, he thought that one started okay and went fairly well for the first two-thirds of its duration. Of course, in the end, after she cheated on him, it turned out to be an utter disaster and that's when he decided never again. The problem was: he just wasn't very good at relationships.

The more he thought about it, the more Castle decided this was perhaps a factor of the fact that he did not have a very good relationship example to mold his own after. His mother married for the first time when he was five and was divorced two years later, so he did not have a strong recollection of that relationship other than it involved a lot of yelling, which left him hiding in his bedroom.

Her next marriage came when he was seventeen and too consumed with his own social life—and causing as much mischief as he could manage while at school. That marriage lasted about the same amount of time before dissolving, but by that point Castle was attending NYU and thus did not have to suffer the battles that came with the end of their relationship.

Despite her lack of success, Castle's mother never badmouthed marriage. She was always willing to try again (and try again she did). As a result, Castle never thought of himself being one hundred percent against marriage. He did, however, know he was not going to jump into nuptials as easily as his mother did. He needed to find the right person. A person with whom he could build a life, a future.

When Kate emailed him on Wednesday stating that she would be journeying back the following day and would love to see him Friday night to—quote—tell him everything, Castle's heart immediately began fluttering in his chest. He didn't just want her to come back and tell her about her trip. Or come back and go to Sunday brunch with him for the first time in seven weeks. No, he wanted her to come back so he could see her every day, curl up on the couch with her and watch a movie so he could kiss her goodnight. In Castle's mind, that was the exact foundation on which he wanted to start a relationship that could potential lead to something permanent.

Beginning at ten to seven, Castle began obsessively looking out for Kate, knowing that she was a habitually early person. He alternated looking at the entrance to the bar and at the time on his phone until, just as the digits on his phone display flipped to 7:00, he spotted her. The vision of her walking through the door, smiling and tucking a strand of hair behind her ear felt like oxygen filling his lungs for the first time in weeks. She was stunning. She wore no more makeup than usual and a simple black dress he'd seen her in at least a dozen times, but the fact that he knew the journey they were about to embark on made her all the more beautiful to him.

Castle took a step towards the entry way, raised his hand and waived, hoping she would spot him. He watched her eyes search the crowded area, land on him, and relax into a smile as she nodded her head, acknowledging his presence. She made her way through a cluster of people trying to exit the crowded bar area and came to a near standstill before slithering through like a salmon spawning up stream. It was only when she broke free that Castle realized she was not alone, but being followed by a blonde man equal to his own height. Strange. What was that about?

"Castle! Oh my gosh—feels like forever, right?" She laughed and stood on her toes to give him a kiss on the cheek.

"Longer than forever," he replied, beaming down at her.

She immediately stepped back from his embrace and snagged her arm around the elbow of the blonde man behind her. She dragged him forward and made the introductions. "This is William Fitzgerald; William, this is Richard Castle."

"Pleasure," William said, reaching out his hand.

Still confused, but maintaining an expression of politeness, Castle shook his hand. From just that one spoken word Castle could tell the man was a Brit, which proved even more intriguing. "Yes; it's nice to meet you. How…how do you to know each other?"

Kate giggled and looked up at her companion. "Do you want to tell him or should I?"

"He's your friend, darling; you should have the honors."

Turning back to Castle, Kate's grin stretched wider across her face. "Castle, this is my _fiancé_."

Instinctively, the writer took a step back, feeling as though he'd been hit in the chest with a battering ram. Surely…surely he'd heard her wrong. Fiancé? No, she hadn't said that. That…made no sense. This was Kate—Kate! Back in college they'd teased her mercilessly when she'd left slip that she had strict rules about how long she would date a man before sleeping with him. That girl would never—never!—get engaged to someone she knew less than a year let alone two months!

"I'm sorry—what?"

"My fiancé—he's my fiancé."

Yep, okay, she was definitely saying fiancé, but…what!? "Does…does that still mean future husband in England?" Castle asked, feeling his entire face break out with sweat. No, no, no. This was not happening. This was _not_ happening. The night was supposed to end with them together. Not Kate hanging on the arm of another man. Jesus, the adoring way she looked at him. What was going on!?

"Castle!" Kate laughed and smacked at his forearm. "C'mon!"

"I…I'm sorry. I just…I'm shocked," he said, turning and groping out a hand for the high top table his mostly empty scotch glass rested on. Yep, he was definitely going to need more of that. And a chair; he needed to sit.

When he slid into his previously occupied seat, he was able to witness William pulling out Kate's chair and skimming his hand across her shoulders once she sat. She grinned at him, and Castle's stomach did a summersault in his gut. "How, um, how did you two meet?" he asked.

"Well, it's kind of a funny story, actually."

"I'm sure," Castle said, gulping down the remainder of the amber liquid.

"I'm going to get us a round. White wine, love?" William asked his companion. She nodded and thanked him. He asked Castle to pick his poison as well, stating the next round was on him.

"Castle," Kate hissed once he was gone. The writer's eyes focused on her. "Real quick before he comes back—I know you're shocked. I probably should have warned you but…" She shook her head as though she changed her thought mid-sentence. "Look just try to keep an open mind about William, okay? He's a really, really great guy."

"Sure, absolutely. I mean, he'd have to be for you to be engaged to him, right?" Castle said with a forced laugh. Meanwhile, his left hand, which rested in his lap, balled into an ever tighter fist. Keep an open mind? Sure, he'd keep an open mind. It was the only way he'd keep from pummeling the British bastard.

When he returned balancing three drinks in his hands, Kate smiled up at the square-jawed, blue-eyed blonde man. Fiancé; this was her fiancé. She had to keep reminding herself. True, it had only been four days since he proposed, but it still seemed completely unbelievable that it was true—that he was hers.

Seven weeks earlier, during her flight across the Atlantic, Kate decided this was it; she was making a change then and there. Really, her thoughts of alerting the course of her life began during Castle's mother's wedding a month prior. She'd let them simmer and stew, warming up to the idea of letting go of the past and moving on to brighter things. This was not a decision that should be taken lightly. It was, after all, her future.

Kate Beckett was a workaholic. She knew this and accepted it about herself. From the day she graduated high school and as she moved seamlessly through her bachelor's degree and into her master's, Kate had her eye on the prize. She was going to get a doctorate, come hell or high water. Her parents, both lawyers, had their doctorates and so she would get hers; no questions about it.

For ten years she worked hard in school, studying, writing papers, and re-writing papers. Her life did not have a moratorium on fun or dating. She took time off to go to baseball games with the boys and had boyfriend now and then, but when it came right down to it her degree took priority. On the cusp of her thirtieth year, Kate did not regret that decision. She had proudly earned her doctorate and wouldn't change any of the decisions she made on her way to that end goal. Yet, with that final degree in hand it was time for her to move on to her next journey.

Though she in no way had a desire to follow in Martha Rodgers' footsteps (she was more of a one-and-done girl when it came to marriage) the woman's wedding had reminded her that yes, she wanted to get married and yes, she wanted to have a family, and she wanted both of those things preferably before the end of the next decade. Thus, sitting in her cramped middle seat on that British Airways flight, Kate made a list—a mental list of the qualities she wanted to find in her future life partner.

Did she expect to find a man who ticked an alarming number of those boxes on her third day in a foreign country? No. Did she expect that man would reciprocate her strong, almost immediate feelings? Of course not. Yet, six and a half weeks later, there they sat.

"William and I met on my third day in Oxford. I was just kind of wandering around the town, trying to get my bearings, but I was being totally clueless. You should have seen me, Castle. I had a map—a real paper map—and I was trying to use that to find my way…only to realize that GPS has totally ruined my ability to follow a real map!"

When she laughed, Castle smiled and nodded; without his iPhone he would certainly be doomed, especially if he ever got lost.

"Anyway, so I was walking around, not paying attention, trying to find my way back to the house I was staying at when I literally ran smack into someone. I bet you'll never guess who that is!"

When Castle watched his normally calm, rational, rarely emotional friend giggle like a school girl as she stoked the forearm of her betrothed, he fought the urge to gag. Who was she? What had happened to her?! "It was William, I bet." He responded, attempting (and failing) to mask the dullness of his tone.

"It was me." William confirmed.

Kate chewed on her bottom lip at the memory. "What you must have thought of me—I probably looked like a mess. I'd been caught in the rain earlier that day," she added as an explanation for Castle's benefit.

"You looked beautiful, of course."

Kate felt a shiver travel down her spine as she always did when William called her beautiful using his delectable accent. Then she turned back to the writer. "William gave me directions, but I was still confused so he offered to walk me back to my place and…that was it," she concluded with a happy shrug.

"He proposed to you on the walk!?" Castle asked, his eyes wide.

She laughed. "Don't be ridiculous Castle. No, he proposed a few days ago."

"When I realized I just couldn't stand the thought of her going back to America without me," William finished before slipping an arm around Kate's back.

 _Right_ , Castle thought. _Because waiting just a few weeks to propose makes MUCH more sense_! "Wow…well, that is…quite a story."

"I know; crazy right?" Kate laughed.

 _Crazy indeed_ , Castle thought. Beyond crazy. Completely and totally insane and one hundred percent the opposite of what he thought would be their topic of discussion that evening. Nevertheless, he took the change in stride. "So, Will, what is it that you do?"

"It's William," he corrected.

"He doesn't like nicknames," Kate added quietly.

Castle apologized quickly, but William shook his head. "You didn't know. And I'm a professor, actually."

"Oh, so you worked with Kate?"

"No, I have my PhD in Archeology."

"Archeology…interesting," Castle commented. _And boring as hell!_ He added to himself.

William smiled. "I enjoy it."

"Listen, Castle, I'm sure you had some grand dinner plan for us, but honestly? We're really beat. I mean, for us it feels pretty late."

Castle bobbed his head. "Sure, sure—time change; I get it. But, ah, before you go. I-" Castle paused, mid-thought. What was he doing? What was he going to say? "I need to ask you if you've _completely lost your damn mind_?!" That was what he wanted to say, but of course he could not. Instead he settled for: "I…I'm going to throw you an engagement party—I want to, that is."

Kate's eyes widened. "What? Oh, Castle, no that's not-"

"Please," he interrupted. "I insist. Truthfully…well, it was supposed to be a surprise, but I actually have a little welcome home party type thing for you planned tomorrow afternoon."

She smiled gently and tilted her head to the side. "Castle that's sweet but you didn't have to."

He smiled and sipped his drink. Welcome home party slash congratulations Kate and Castle on your new relationship slash now apparently an engagement party for Kate and her professor friend…that was all the same thing, right? "No trouble at all. So what do you say? All of our friends will be there and I'm sure they're going to want to meet William."

Kate laughed and shrugged; clearly, she had no choice in the matter. "I…well o-okay. Thanks, Castle."

He shook his head and held up his hand, palm out. "It's nothing. I'll text you the details okay? You two kids go home and, ah, rest up," he said, forcing himself not to think of the other things they might do.

Kate slid down from her chair, walked over and gave him a kiss on the check. "See you tomorrow."

Castle nodded and shook Williams hand before watching them walk away. "Yeah…tomorrow…"


	5. Chapter 5

_*Important A/N* If you follow me on Twitter or Tumblr, you'll know this has been a bit of a rough week for me re: this fic. Despite the drama, I have decided to continue posting this story with no alternations in schedule or content, but I'd like to say this:_

 _As a perfectionist, it's upsetting to me to think that I've written something that a large portion of people find to be of poor quality or substance. I have high standards for myself and I always want to produce works that people enjoy. Despite this, I realize you can't win 'em all, so to speak, and some of you are not going to like this story no matter what I do and that's okay, because other's do like it. I stand by what I wrote and how I wrote it because I believe it to be a good mashup of both Castle & the movie. If you disagree, that's perfectly alright; you're welcome to stop reading at any time._

 _Also, for at least the time being I will continue to moderate guest reviews to weed out any that are particularly mean spirited or off topic. Thanks!_

* * *

 **Chapter Five**

 _JFC! She's engaged to a Brit professor_ was the text Castle sent Javier and Kevin on his way home Friday evening. Naturally, they responded with confusion and, later, shock. None of them could believe that Kate, the woman they had known for the duration of their adult lives, would jump into a marriage so quickly, yet that did not make the situation any less real.

Friday night, Castle didn't sleep; he lay awake cursing himself and the decisions he'd made. Why hadn't he just emailed Kate two weeks earlier and confessed his intentions. True, she would have already been with William in some capacity, but they wouldn't have been engaged. She would have known how he felt and they could have been together then instead of him being alone, tossing and turning over the mattress.

By four a.m. he had a renewed sense of determination. He was down, but definitely not out. Whatever Kate had—or thought she had—with William was new, fresh, and exciting. That much was clear, but once she was back in Manhattan—back in the real world—she would come to her senses. William was simply not right for her. She got caught up in a moment—the fantasy and intrigue of a foreign land—and he couldn't blame her for that, but he was convinced reality would bring her back to him.

With that fire of determination burning in his chest (and what felt like half a gallon of caffeine-filled liquids) Castle busied himself preparing for the party. This was his home turf; he had the advantage over the preppy, well-accented professor. He knew Kate better than William ever hoped to, which was exactly why he was going to throw her the best damn engagement party she'd ever seen.

* * *

By quarter after four that afternoon the guests began arriving. Castle's email invitation had stated the party would be from four to seven, with cocktails and refreshments being served. Both were, of course, provided by his usual caterer.

When Javier and Kevin arrived they found the host immediately and expressed their shock, but more so their concern for their friend's wellbeing. "I might not have thought this was the best idea you had, but this does completely suck for you, bro," Javier told him.

Castle shook off the comment, refusing to admit defeat. "I just don't get what she sees in this guy. He's just so…British."

Javier shrugged. "Yeah, but chicks dig that shit."

"But this is Kate we're talking about," Kevin rationalized. "She'd hardly go crazy over someone just for their accent."

"And yet—ah, here's the happy couple now," Castle said, his tone positively oozing sarcasm. He spotted them walking through the door: Kate dressed in an emerald green cap sleeve top with jeans and black kitten heels, her arm linked through that of her betrothed. William dressed in a navy blazer, white button-down and khaki trousers; his blonde hair was parted on the right and gelled to either side.

"And here we go," Castle muttered under his breath before crossing the room and plastering a smile across his face to greet the guests of honor. "Kate! William! Welcome to my humble abode."

William scanned the expansive loft and then back at its owner. "I'm not sure I would call this humble."

"Yeah, well neither is its owner," Kate said pointedly. Then, she stepped in and gave him a one-armed hug.

After hugging Kate, Castle signaled for Javier to turn down the music. After he'd done so, Castle stood by the entryway and commanded the attention of his guests. "Everyone! Everyone! If I could just have a quick moment of your time, I just want to thank you all for coming. As you know, this party was originally meant to welcome Kate back to the city, and of course we're all happy that she's here, but now, unexpectedly, it has a secondary purpose. So, if you'll join me in raising your glasses in a toast to Kate Beckett and her new fiancé William Fitzgerald. To William and Kate!"

While Kate looked perturbed, William appeared positively mortified as a gasp followed by reluctant clapping filled the room.

A moment later, once the music was back on, Kevin stepped up beside Castle and clapped him on the shoulder. "Hey—William and Kate. That's funny; they're like that royal couple."

Castle shot his friend and unappreciative expression. Kevin shrank back and hurried off to find his wife.

After he checked on the food and liquor supply, Castle continued to make his rounds through the party. On his way past the office, he spotted Kate's father standing off to the side sipping on a can of diet coke. He made his way over to greet the one other partygoer who might feel as shell-shocked as he.

Eight years later, Castle vividly remembered the first evening he met Jim Beckett. Very shortly after Kate graduated with her bachelors, she and two other grad students had moved into their own positively microscopic apartment. At the time, Castle had been trying to woo one of the roommates to date—okay, sleep with—him. He'd gone over to their place in search of her, but instead found a frustrated-to-the-point-of-tears Kate and her father passed out on the floor just inside her apartment.

Up until that point, Castle knew very little about Kate's family life other than the basics: she was an only child and her mother had passed away years earlier. He knew her father, a law professor, lived in the city, but he did not have a sense of their relationship other than it was somewhere in the middle between "best friends" and "not part of each other's lives."

That night Castle learned that Jim had taken his wife's death hard and turned to alcohol as a coping mechanism. For a while he hid his disease well, but it had become significantly worse in the recent months, which was why he ended up passed out on the floor of his daughter's apartment. Castle had hauled the man to the couch and sat with Kate until he'd sobered up enough for them to get him in a cab and return him to his own apartment.

In the years since that event, Jim had gone to rehab returned to his profession as a professor. As far as Castle knew, his relationship with his daughter was a good one. He and Castle had a decent rapport as well; Jim made at least one or two visits to Castle's beach house each summer, and they attended Mets' games as a group as well.

"Jim," Castle, said extending his hand.

"Rick. Thanks for doing this for Katie." Jim replied, shaking the larger man's hand.

Castle shook his head. "My pleasure, really. So, ah, what do you make of this?" he asked, gesturing with his beer towards the couple of the hour.

Jim let out a breathy laugh and shook his head. "Honestly? I'm…stunned."

"Join the club," Castle muttered into the mouth of his beer bottle. "Did you know about him? Before yesterday, I mean."

Jim bobbed his head. "She said she met someone named William who worked at the university and he was helping her out but I had no real evidence they were dating let alone…"

"Right, right."

"We had lunch earlier. Seems like a good man, very gentlemanly. Very…stoic."

"Very boring," Castle concluded. Jim gave the writer a fatherly stare, but eventually nodded his head in agreement.

* * *

Almost twenty minutes passed before Castle made his way back to Kate. She was chatting with one of her former roommates—one he hadn't slept with, so he felt it was safe to approach.

"…Oh my gosh, this is just so exciting!" The roommate, Casey, gushed. "You have a wedding to plan! Ooh! I'm jealous! Have you given any thought as to who your maid of honor will be? That's an important decision, you know!" The girl winked at Kate.

Kate laughed and glanced up at her fiancé. "Um, I…I dunno. I hadn't thought about it too much but…I guess Castle makes the most sense."

At the mention of his name, Castle nearly choked. "Wh-what?!"

Kate shrugged and looked at him. "Well…women usually pick their best friend as their maid of honor, and you're kind of mine. At least, you're the friend that's known me the longest."

"I, ah…I…" Castle stammered, having no idea what to say.

Casey, clearly singed, snipped, "Well he wouldn't look very good in a dress."

Kate laughed at the preposterous mental image. "No, he wouldn't. What do you say Castle? I won't make you wear a dress, I promise."

"Oh, ah, sure! Sure why not!" he said. As far as he was concerned there was never going to be a wedding anyway, so what did it hurt to agree to something he'd never have to do?

* * *

By six thirty that evening, the partygoers had begun to dissipate, moving on to dinner or other plans for the evening. Castle said goodbye to each guest as they departed which actually turned out to be a welcome distraction from his conversation with William. For Kate's sake he was trying to play nice, trying to get to know the man. After all, there was clearly something in him she found significantly attractive or she wouldn't have started dating him let alone agreed to marry him. Despite twenty minutes of conversation, Castle had yet to find that something.

Simply put: William was extraordinarily dull. Not that this was shocking, given his chosen career as an archeology professor. During their conversation, Castle realized William wasn't even into anything cool like dinosaurs or cursed mummy temples. No, his field of study was something about homes or cultures—Castle wasn't sure; it was all he could do not to fall asleep during their conversation. Not only was the subject matter dry, but William's voice lacked color and inflection which, given his career as a storyteller, Castle found appalling.

Finally, a few minutes before seven, Kate approached and skimmed her hand down her fiancé's arm. She smiled up at him and then turned to Castle. "Thank you so much for this—really. It was…unexpected, but very nice."

"Anything for you, Kate." Castle smiled at her. "We still on for brunch tomorrow?"

Despite being tired, Kate's expression brightened at this concept; she had nearly forgotten the following day was Sunday. " _Ruby's_?" she questioned. He bobbed his head. "I wouldn't miss it."

They finished their goodbyes before Castle walked over to Javier, Kevin and Jenny, who were doing their part to clean up since the caterers had left. Castle thanked them for their efforts and went to the kitchen to grab more garbage bags. The boys followed him.

"Saw you talking to William. Glad to see you didn't punch him." Javier commented.

"Considered it, but it wouldn't have been sporting of me; he's so boring it wouldn't have been any fun. Not even sure if he would have noticed—probably would have just kept talking about his latest paper." Castle scoffed.

"So he's a fun and exciting guy, huh?" Kevin asked, though he was obviously kidding.

Castle rolled his eyes. He didn't even know where to begin. Well, actually, he did. "He goes by William—William! He doesn't even have a nickname! He doesn't _like_ nicknames! Who does that?"

Kevin shrugged. "Your mother calls you Richard."

Castle looked at him pointedly. "Yes, but that's my mother. None of you guys would ever call me Richard."

Kevin shrugged, agreeing to this point. "So what are you going to do?"

Castle thought for a moment. He'd been debating that point for quite some time, yet kept coming back to the same conclusion. After his titillating conversation with Kate's fiancé, in his mind there was only one solution. "I'm going to have to break them up."

Javier grinned and clapped his friend on the back. "That's my boy!"

Kevin balked immediately. "What? Javi I thought you didn't want Castle dating Kate?"

"No," he corrected, "I don't want Castle dating anyone, but better the enemy we know than a new nemesis."

To this, Kevin rolled his eyes. Then, turning to the writer, he said, "Castle, think about this."

"I am thinking about this. What's the best way to do it? This is Kate, here. I can't just come out and tell her to dump him—she'll rebel and do the opposite." In the decade he'd known her, Castle knew one thing for certain about his best friend: she could be stubborn as hell. If her mind was set on something, it was extremely difficult to change it. Changing it caused her stubborn streak to kick in, which made her want to do it all the more—just for spite.

In debate situations, she was receptive to rebuttals assuming cold, hard factual evidence was presented. When evidence contradicting her statements was provided, she did back down and concede her point. However, matters of the heart were hardly fact based situations. Changing Kate's mind would take finesse and, dare he think it, no small amount of manipulation.

"Hang on," Kevin said, "what if she's happy with him? Did you ever think of that?"

Castle laughed at that preposterous notion. "Please? Did you meet the guy?"

"He's a douche bag," Javier said.

"Total douche bag," Castle echoed.

Kevin shook his head slowly at the coconspirators. "For the record: I think this is a terrible idea."

"Actually it's perfect. And, as long as I'm her maid of honor, it will be much easier for-"

"Wait," Javier interrupted. "You're her WHAT?!"

Castle held up his hand. "Long story—but it gives me a total pass to be all up close and nosy about the impending wedding, right? And what better way to destroy it from the inside out. See: perfect!"

"Whatever you say, Castle," Kevin said, his tone indicating extreme skepticism. "Whatever you say."


	6. Chapter 6

_A/N: So sorry - last time i forgot to thank **Lord of Kavaka** for my awesome cover art - thanks!_

 _And thank you to everyone for your amazing and supportive reviews! I really, really appreciate them!_

* * *

 **Chapter Six**

A block from Ruby's, Richard Castle slowed his walk to a near standstill, sucked in a deep breath, and pushed it out slowly from between o-shaped lips. It was fine; everything was going to be fine. He could do this.

The uncertainty roiling in his gut did not emanate from the fact that he would be sharing brunch with Kate for the first time in seven weeks. That was actually the highlight of the event. Back to their Sunday routine—finally! No, his nerves came from the topics he anticipated them discussing. Namely, Kate's new fiancé. But it was fine—as long as he stuck to his plan, everything would be fine.

Castle slept better Saturday night than he had the night before, though not by much. His brain was consumed with thoughts of Kate and the blonde Brit she toted around his apartment like he was the greatest prize since Lord Stanley's Cup. She stroked his arm, danced her fingertips over his shoulder, and gripped his hand in hers. It seemed as though they were always connected in some way—what was up with that?

 _That's what people in love do_ , the cruel side of his brain told him somewhere around one a.m., but he refused to buy into such a notion. Kate was not in love; that wasn't possible. One could not fall in love with another person after knowing them such a short time period; it was too improbable. She was in lust, yes, but not in love and that was exactly what he needed to point out to her.

Castle's plan for their first post-William discussion was simple. He was going to ask Kate more things about the professor—his likes and interest. Castle could easily do so under the guise of being curious about his good friend's future husband. Castle suspected that as she answered these questions, he would be able to pick out bits and pieces that did not make sense with Kate's life and he intended on pointing them out to her—innocently, of course. Or in as innocent a voice as he could maintain.

Just in case her first few answers did not lead him to glaringly obvious potholes in her grand plan to marry this near stranger, Castle had a backup plan. During his conversation with William the prior evening, the Brit had let slip that he had never actually seen a baseball game; evidently he had no interest in the sport. This, Castle was certain, would ultimately be William's Achilles' heel. If there was one thing Kate Beckett unquestionably loved it was baseball.

Taking one last deep breath, Castle pulled open the door to _Ruby's_ and stepped inside. The coffee-and-grease scent hit his nostrils and sent a chill down his spine. Yes, this certainly was the perfect setting for stage one of his break up the wedding plan.

Just as he turned to greet Denise with his usual flirtatious demeanor, he noticed that she was staring at him oddly. She gazed up at him as though he'd suddenly acquired a horribly offensive tattoo all over his forehead. "What is it?"

Denise shook her head slowly. "Nothing, nothing. She's in the back to the left of the restrooms."

Castle faltered monetarily as he glanced at their usual table by the front window and then back at Denise. Their table was empty, so why was Kate in the back of the restaurant? "But-"

"She said you needed a table for three," came Denise's clipped reply. Then, she shoved a menu at his chest before turning away.

Stunned, Castle shuffled forward, loosely gripping on to the menu. Denise seemed angry with him, which was perplexing in of itself, but yet not the most confusing thing for Castle's brain. Table for three? Why in the hell would she need a—

Oh.

Castle spotted them, clustered together on one side of a table with four chairs. His stomach sank all the way to his loafers at the sight of the blonde haired Brit. Kate wasn't alone. She'd brought the professor. She'd brought her fiancé to their brunch. Their first brunch in seven weeks! Their brunch!

The writer gripped the menu with white knuckles as he tip-toed his way through the narrow spaces between tables. He was just about to lose his temper when he forced himself to take another deep breath. He was the best friend—the (lord help him) maid of honor—he needed to stay on Kate's good side at all costs. Grumbling to himself, he stepped up to their table. "Good morning! Kate—you brought William…." Though he spoke through gritted teeth, he'd actually managed an upbeat tone, which at that point he considered a win.

"Of course." Kate looked up at Castle with a laugh. "What was I going to do? Leave him in my apartment?"

"No, that would have been silly," Castle replied as he sat down, hoping neither of them would pick up on his sarcasm.

"Kate says you two come here a lot for brunch," William said. He picked up his menu and examined it with a level of disgust he didn't bother to hide. "It certainly is interesting."

"It's actually our favorite place for brunch in the city." Castle informed him wisely.

"The food is excellent." Kate pointed out.

"But it's no McLaren's, right?" William said. Kate laughed and elbowed him.

Castle watched this exchange with no small amount of revulsion. He suspected McLaren's was a place where they'd had a date—possibly several—which meant in the interest of keeping his breakfast down he wanted to hear nothing about it.

When their waitress arrived, Kate and Castle requested coffee while William asked what teas the diner offered. The waitress shrugged and said she'd have to check. Barely a minute later she returned with two mugs of coffee, one of hot water, and a handful of random packets of tea bags. "Evidently tea isn't a common order at _Ruby_ 's," Castle commented. Glancing at Kate, he saw her fighting to keep a straight face and saw this as a positive sign; finally a little normalcy!

William shuffled through the packets before choosing one marked Earl Grey with utmost skepticism. With lips pursed tightly, he ripped the package open and submerged the bag into his mug of water, swirling it around with a resigned sigh.

Seeing an opportunity, Castle asked, "So, William, is this your first time in the States?"

He shook his head. "No, no; I've been here a few times."

"To New York?"

"Once," he replied. "But only for the day. I was with a pack of schoolmates; we saw the Empire State Building and Statue of Liberty."

"Ah, so that means Kate'll have to show you the real New York," Castle pointed out, giving his friend a wink.

"I believe I'm experiencing that right now," William said after sipping his tea with a grimace.

"Crappy diner tea is not the real New York." Kate pointed out.

"No it certainly isn't. How long you gonna be in town for? You can come out to my place in the Hamptons. That's like the fancy real New York." Did Castle really want Kate and William in his guest room doing—his stomach flipped in his gut—god only knew what? Of course not, but he was a subscriber to that classic theory: keep your friends close and your enemies closer.

"Well, actually," Kate said, jumping in before her fiancé even opened his mouth. "It's interesting you brought that up. We were actually talking about dates for our wedding."

"Ah, perfect!" Castle smiled at her. Perfect as long as they were many, many months away. "What were you guys thinking?"

Before Kate could answer, their waitress returned to take their meal orders. Castle looked at Kate, as she always started their brunch orders, expecting to her the usual request exit her mouth. Instead, he was absolutely floored when she requested a bagel with a side order of bacon. Picking up on the writer's shock she explained with a chuckle, "You just can't get a good bagel in England."

He nodded before muttering out his order for eggs, hash browns, toast and sausage. William ordered the same less the sausage. "I don't think I'm feeling adventurous enough for your American diner breakfast meats," he explained after the waitress left.

 _Yeah,_ Castle thought, forcing himself not to roll his eyes, _because regular American diner sausage is much weirder than blood pudding_.

"So anyway, you guys were talking about dates?" Castle asked, sipping his coffee. "Fall is probably too soon and you probably don't want to do it during school so New Years? Or June? June weddings are the big thing, right?"

Kate glanced at her fiancé, nervously pulling her bottom lip between her teeth, and then back at her writer friend. "Actually, we were thinking August."

Castle nodded in approval. "Good, good—plenty of time to plan and-"

" _This_ August." She clarified.

Castle blinked at her. Surely he'd heard her wrong. There was no way she meant August of that current year. It was already mid-July!

Kate patted the arm of her British companion. "We're getting married in three weeks."

Again, Castle blinked and his chest constricted. Oh god, was this what a heart attack felt like? "You're getting married in three weeks?" he echoed, his brain still trying to process the information.

"Yes."

"No…"

"Yes."

"No."

"Yes—Castle!" she laughed before their back-and-forth pattern could continue. "C'mon you're my maid of honor, right? At least pretend to be supportive."

At the final word in her statement, Castle brain shifted away from "neutral" and back into gear. Supportive—happy and supportive. That was him, alright. At least, on the outside. Inside his heart was shredding into smaller and smaller pieces. "Wha—I…No, no. I am supportive. It's just," he mustered a fake chuckle. "Three weeks? I mean, how can you even plan a wedding that quickly?"

Kate arched an eyebrow at him. "Didn't your mother plan her wedding to Chet in three weeks?"

Castle pressed his lips together. Oh, damn, she was getting crafty on him wasn't she? "It was four, and they were engaged for a least a month before that. Besides, it was her fourth wedding—you can't plan pomp and circumstance in only three weeks."

"Your mother has been married four times?" William asked his eyes widened.

Castle looked at him briefly. "Yeah, marriage is like a hobby for her."

Before Castle could turn the attention back to Kate, William asked, "Really? How long was she married to your father?"

Now fighting to keep his tone pleasant, Castle said, "She never was."

"Castle's actually never met his father," Kate informed William, though she did so in a way that made it clear that would be the last sentence spoken about the topic. Castle was grateful for this, as it was not his favorite point of discussion (particularly with those he did not know well) but more so, they were getting off topic and he needed to steer the conversation back to the main, panic-inducing point.

"Back to this whole…wedding in three weeks thing."

Their conversation took a brief hiatus when the waitress brought their meals. After they'd settled in, Kate continued. "It's not going to be a wedding per se. It'll be simple and intimate."

Castle nodded. He completely understood anyone who wished for a quiet, intimate affair. Unfortunately, his mother was not one of those people, which was why her fourth trip down the aisle was witnessed by guests well into the triple digits.

"It'll be at my family's castle outside London."

Castle blinked at the gentleman. "I'm sorry your what?"

"Oh you should see it!" Kate beamed. "I mean I've only seen pictures but it's gorgeous! Just gorgeous!"

"Uh huh." Oh yeah, he was definitely going to be sick. Looking down at his plate with disinterest, Castle realized he still had all his pieces of sausage. Wanting to remedy this mostly for Kate's sake, he pushed his plate towards hers and gestured at the meat with his fork.

"Oh I'm fine, thanks," Kate said, casually waving the plate away with her hand before crunching down on a piece of bacon.

It was all Castle could do to keep his jaw from crashing open. Unbelievable! She was unbelievable! Though he recognized the pettiness of this being the final straw, he simply didn't care. She left the country promising they'd still talk, but they did not. She showed up seven weeks later with a fiancé—a fiancé!—in tow. She never told him, her very best friend, about said fiancé before his arrival. She was getting married in an absolutely absurd amount of time and now! Now she was cheating him out of his sausage and bacon brunch!

Clearly oblivious to the aneurism her friend was having, Kate causally sipped from her coffee mug. "Anyway, I'm sure you're wondering why we're rushing into this wedding thing."

Castle felt a cold sweat breaking out on his forehead. _Please don't be pregnant. Please, please, please don't be pregnant._ He begged internally. Of course he did not want Kate to not be a mother if she so chose, but he knew such news would completely push him over the brink at that period in time. "Uh, yeah," he managed. "A bit."

"It's just…we want to have it all done before the fall semester starts."

Castle nodded; finally something that made a little bit of sense. "Oh jeez wow I didn't think about that." Turning to William he asked, "So you'll be moving to New York then?"

"Well actually-"

"We're still deciding on that," Kate finished for her fiancé.

"Right, sure. Big decision. Wouldn't want to rush into anything."

Kate gave her writer friend a perturbed look upon picking up his double meaning. Castle chose to stare intently at his half empty plate rather than acknowledge her silent scolding. "Well, anyway, even though it's going to be a small event, there's still a lot to do and-"

"So let me help you," Castle said. Immediately, he felt better. Three weeks; three weeks until the wedding. That was a significant setback in his plan, but he was determined to follow through with it and what better way to do that than spend as much time with Kate as he possibly could?

Kate laughed. "Oh no, Castle you don't-"

"Kate, please." He cut her off with a grin oozing charm. "As your maid of honor I insist. Share the burden. It's not like I have a real job to keep up with. Besides, I just went through all this with Mother so, really, who is more qualified than me?"

Kate considered this a moment; he did have an extremely valid point. "Okay, you're in, but really Castle if it becomes too much."

He shook his head. "It won't be and, truly, it'll be my pleasure."


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven**

By Wednesday Castle knew absolutely everything there was to know about the impending Beckett-Fitzgerald nuptials. Which, in all honesty, was not that much—at least, insofar as concrete plans. He knew a lot of hypotheticals and a lot of plans that began with "If we can make it work…" but, mostly, he knew every detail about Kate's vision of a perfect wedding day.

As she had spent the majority of the previous decade as "one of the guys," Castle could not think of a one single conversation the two of them had regarding weddings aside from those surrounding his mother's nuptials. Even then, the topics were abstract at best. He recalled her saying that she never wanted anything like his mother's circus-themed wedding, but that was hardly specific to her; after that fiasco, Castle imagined many if not all of the guests shared that opinion.

During their conversations, Castle learned that Kate preferred medium-sized weddings around a hundred and twenty or a hundred and fifty guests. This, of course, was not what she would be receiving, as she explained to him that her and William's guest list was approximately forty people. When his brow furrowed and he asked if she would be ok with the smaller affair, she waived her hand casually at him and insisted it was fine. Then, she joked the only thing she'd really miss out on was more presents.

The reason for their limited guest list, Castle discovered, was due to physical space. William wished to marry at his family's castle and Kate had no objections to this; from the pictures she saw, the place was like a dream. It did, however, have limited space for large events. In the past they discovered that while fifty seats fit, it really was much too tight to be comfortable, so they needed to keep their list as close to forty as they could.

Kate accepted this and rationalized it by saying it was just as well. If her wedding was going to be in New York, she would have invited coworkers or casual friends, but she could hardly expect such people to fly all the way to England for her wedding. Thus, it made much more sense to keep their guest list small with just family and very close friends.

Castle heard her explanation and understood it; it was logical—practical even, but he also knew her face told a different story. Kate, he knew, was far from being as showy or extravagant as his mother yet he also knew how difficult it would be to keep her list of invitees at a maximum of twenty—including her father, aunt and cousins, assuming they were all able to attend on short notice.

While adding "incomplete guest list" to his mental list of reasons why this wedding was absurd and needed to be stopped, Castle soon found himself with several more reasons including the fact that Kate would be unable to have a DJ at the reception like she wanted. In fact, there wasn't going to be a reception in the traditional—well, American—sense at all. Instead, the "reception" merely consisted of a very nice dinner followed by a little bit of dancing.

According to Kate, William's parents weren't much for throwing a party-'til-dawn affair and were merely doing a bit of music to placate the tradition. Naturally, Castle protested this absurdity, but Kate said there was nothing she could do about it. William's parents were gracious enough to host their wedding and she remained grateful to them for that. If not for their generosity, they probably would not have been able to find a venue with such short notice.

With this comment, Castle could not stop himself from suggesting that perhaps it would make more sense for them to postpone the nuptials. Though he maintained a light, helpful-sounding tone, he received a scowl from Kate. They were getting married August first and that was that.

Though he still could not understand why she felt the need to rush, Castle did not continue his protest; he knew there would be no point in it. Pushing any further might push him right out of the maid of honor spot. Absurd as it was, he needed to keep one foot in the wedding to take every available opportunity to point out its ridiculousness. Though, as he learned, he needed to do so more delicately; less directly.

Deciding he'd heard enough about floral arrangements and traditional British wedding foods to last a lifetime, Castle decided on a different approach. He extended an invitation to William via Kate to attend his weekly Wednesday evening basketball game with the guys. This, he decided, was a brilliant scheme and all part of his plan to keep the enemy close. With Kevin and Javier on his side, he could easily pick William apart and discover more reasons why he and Kate simply weren't meant to be.

That Wednesday, Castle met William outside the gym to which they all belonged. After signing William in using one of his guest passes, Castle led the way down to the men's locker room where they left their bags. While waiting for the other two to arrive, Castle and William sat together on the bleachers at the side of the basketball courts.

"I just wanted to thank you for everything you're doing for the wedding. Kate says you're a lifesaver."

Castle smiled at the Brit. Kate was speaking his praises to her fiancé. Good, that was very good. Maybe the more she talked about him William would realize that Castle was the one Kate was meant to be with, not him. Then, perhaps he would bow out like a gentleman and return to England. Though he realized this scenario probably had a less than one percent chance of working out, Castle saw no harm in keeping it in the back of his mind.

"Well, Kate is my best friend—anything I can do to help, I will."

William gave Castle a small smile before reaching down to adjust the laces on his sneaker. "Bit odd, isn't it?"

"What is?"

William looked up at the writer. "Men and women best friends. Is that common in America?"

"No, that's pretty unique to Kate and Castle." Castle turned his head to see the smirking Javier approaching, Kevin a few steps behind him.

After shooting his friend a perturbed look, Castle said, "It is not unique to us. I admit it's not _common_ but we are hardly the only male/female best friends in this country."

"Well no that's statistically impossible," Kevin said wisely. "But I bet there aren't too many."

Castle shot his friends a "You're not helping" expression while William asked, "You met in university, right? I'm sorry—you call it college."

Castle resisted the urge to roll his eyes at the tone William used when correcting himself. It felt like he was "dumbing down" his comment for the Americans, when they clearly would have understood his meaning if he'd left the statement as it was. "Yes, we did. Her junior year; our senior."

"You all met then?"

Castle shook his head. "No we already knew each other," he said, gesturing to himself, Kevin and Javier. "It's when we met Kate."

William nodded. Then, after a moment of thought he asked, "Was that around the time her mother died?"

Castle pressed his lips together at this comment. If there was one topic he knew his best friend avoided more than any other, it was that of her deceased mother. Clearly, the topic would have been impossible to avoid when wedding planning with her fiancé, though it either was not discussed in much detail or William hadn't paid much attention for him to have incorrectly placed the timeframe. Castle hoped for the later.

"It was about a year and a half after her mother's death," Castle explained.

"Right, right. Such a shame…she died in some sort of accident, right?"

Castle's fists clenched. Now he was sure of it—the bastard hadn't even paid attention to the most important story Kate would ever tell him! "It was murder, actually."

William's eyes widened. "Murder!?"

Kevin stepped in between the two men. Looking up at the Brit he said, "Forgive our dramatic friend. Kate's mother was killed in a hit and run accident; the driver responsible was never found."

William nodded solemnly. "Right…bloody shame. Shall we get to playing then?"

While the other three headed towards the closest free net, Castle hung back, his jaw slack with horror. He could not believe the casual way in which William had brushed off Kate's mother's death? "Bloody shame"?! More like goddamned tragedy and the single defining moment of her early adult years!

Castle still vividly remembered the night he heard the real story—the full story—behind her mother's passing. Several weeks had passed since that fateful night he helped Kate with her drunken, passed-out father. Castle had not spoken a word about the event to Kate in the encounters since. Two years of knowing her taught him one universal truth about her: Kate Beckett could teach Fort Knox a thing or two about safety and protection if the way she kept her personal life under wraps was any indication.

Knowing this, Castle was absolutely stunned when she showed up at his apartment one evening and the whole tale came spilling out. She'd just come from her father's after he'd summoned her with yet another drunken phone call. She explained that she'd emptied his bottle of scotch in the sink for the hundredth time, gave him a bottle of water and sent him to bed. Knowing that her roommate had a date over, she knew she couldn't go home so she wandered around the city until she somehow managed to make her way to Castle's.

Being a good friend—not to mention a gentlemen—he invited her in and offered her a bed for the night. She'd only been sitting beside him on the couch for a few minutes before the tears started. Having never seen her cry before, he was stunned at first, but then did his best to comfort her.

The way she said, "I just don't know how much more of this I can take," felt like a knife driving directly into his heart. He knew from that moment he never wanted to see her cry again—at least, not from being hurt. He vowed in that moment to do whatever he could to prevent any future distress.

As she sobbed, she explained that two and a half years prior her mother had been returning home from a late meeting at her law offices when her car had been broadsided by a driver who ran a red light. Though there was one witness, the driver of the black SUV was never found. Her mother was rushed from the hospital, but never regained consciousness and, twenty hours after the incident, succumbed to her injuries.

Castle had been stunned, not realizing Johanna Beckett's death had been so sudden and violent. He didn't ask any questions; he merely held her close and rubbed her back until she fell asleep. Then, he'd taken her to his bed to sleep so she didn't have to wake up confused and alone in a bedroom she'd never been in before. In the morning, she thanked him for his kindness and asked that he not talk about the prior night's conversation with anyone. Though he wished to tell Kevin and Javier, as such an event explained a great deal about Kate's personality and standoffish tendencies, he obliged her request. (Thankfully, she had told the boys on her own several months later, though not in as great a detail as she told Castle.)

Though the night was clouded with a significant amount of sadness, Castle recalled it as one of his favorite memories with Kate. Her mother's death was, of course, tragic and he never wanted her to be in unnecessary pain, but for the first time that night, stroking her back and telling her softly that everything would be ok, he realized that she was his best friend. Eight years of hindsight told him he probably realized his feelings were a bit stronger than that, but he hadn't seen it at the time. Maybe if he had, things would have been different. Maybe if he had, he would not be about to join a basketball game with Kate's fiancé.

On the bright side, he rationalized to himself, William had never played basketball before and thus his playing was bound to be…well, hilarious.

* * *

"Dude." Javier hissed to his writer friend the moment the Brit had taken his soap and towel to the showers and was thus out of earshot. "Did you see him dunk that ball? He was like Air Jordan!"

"More like Larry Bird," Kevin corrected his friend's reference.

"Trying not to think about that, actually." Castle snipped in response. William's first time playing basketball his ass… The guy was a ringer! Either that or he had the best case of beginner's luck Castle had ever seen.

Still muttering to himself about how the William-and-Kevin team trounced his own (mostly due to the Brit's dunking skills) Castle made his way to the large shower room. Typically, Castle's plan in the large room full of steam and men in their birthday suits was to get in, soap up, and rinse off as efficiently as possible. Avoiding eye contact was a must.

Despite his well perfected routine, Castle found himself walking in face to face with William, who was soaping up, his back to the closest shower head. Unintentionally, Castle caught a glimpse of the Brit's full body and immediately wished he hadn't as William was unquestionably well-endowed. "You've got to be fucking kidding me," the writer muttered under his breath as he hung his towel on the closest free hook.

Even more unfortunate for Castle was that, at that moment, the only free shower head was the one right beside William's. Stepping up, Castle cranked on the water. Just as he silently hoped William would slip on soap, fall and knock himself unconscious, Castle heard him say, "Can I ask you something?"

Forcing a smile, Castle turned to him and said, "Sure; why not." His tone was snippy and, quite honestly, he didn't care.

"Well, I'm curious," William said, turning to face the spray once more. "Did you and Kate ever…"

As his voice had trailed off without completing the thought, Castle questioned, "Ever what?"

"Have a courtship?"

Castle's brow furrowed as he tried to translate the Brit's word to American English. "A courtship? Like dating?" When William bobbed his head, Castle answered. "No, no we never dated."

"Really? Never?"

Castle shook his head. Why was that so hard to believe? Furthermore, if Kate was engaged to him, why did it even matter?"

As thought a lightbulb had gone off in his thick skull, William's eyes widened and he nodded his head. "Oh, I get it. Maid of honor. You're into the lads then, eh? Cheers mate."

Castle nearly choked while Kevin and Javier, who had entered the shower and were standing nearby, began to snigger. "Wha—no. No, no, no. I'm very much into women. Very, very much," he stressed. "Kate and I…we've just known each other for a long time and…we're better as friends," he said, though he hoped very much that wasn't the truth.

Accepting this answer, William nodded his head. "She's not your type. Understood."

* * *

Fifteen minutes later after they'd patted themselves dry and redressed, the four men reconvened out on the sidewalk, where they bid goodbye to William, who was meeting Kate for dinner. As the three friends walked towards the nearest subway station, Javier was the first to break the silence. "Well, I guess we know why Kate's been so giddy lately."

"Why's that?" Castle questioned without even thinking.

Javier blinked at him. "Uhh…because her fiancé has a huge dick."

Despite the ninety degree temperature, Castle shivered. "Thanks for that."

"You don't think that's the reason she's marrying him, do you?" Kevin asked.

Javier shrugged. "Dunno. Maybe. Maybe Kate's all about the-"

"GUYS!" Castle bellowed, silencing his two companions. "I really, _really_ do not need to be thinking about Kate and William…" He gestured wildly with his hands. "…doing it—that."

"Doing it?" Javier parroted. "What are you? A fourteen year old girl?"

Castle grumbled. "Just…drop it, okay? Please?"

Kevin and Javier held up their hands in defeat while Castle walked ahead of them and hopped onto the waiting subway car silent hoping his urge to vomit would soon subside.

* * *

 _A/N: Since many of you have not seen it, I'll clarify - the basketball/locker room scenes are from the movie_

 _thanks for all your reviews & follows - i appreciate it!_


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight**

Richard Castle could be called many things: famous novelist, millionaire, playboy, and now party planner. Specifically: bachelorette weekend planner. This, however, was not a title he planned on retaining once the weekend was over—assuming he survived.

On Thursday, the day after the disastrous basketball game, Kate dropped the latest wedding bomb: not only was she getting married in two weeks and two days, but she was only spending ten of those remaining days in the city. After that, she would be flying back to England to coordinate wedding plans there. After all, it was difficult to interview florists and caterers while in a completely different country let alone continent.

Though Castle remained confident he would be able to stop the wedding, he did accept the possibility that there was a small—less than one percent, by his estimation—possibility Kate would in fact marry William. If that was the case, Castle did not want her to miss out on any pre-wedding traditions, particularly if those wedding traditions were to be planned or managed by the maid of honor. The last thing he wanted to do was fail her.

Thus, he sprang into action to plan a wedding shower and a bachelorette party, but Kate reined him in. She did not want to have a wedding shower both due to the short time frame and because no one from William's side of the family could attend. She also protested the bachelorette party, but Castle would hear none of it; getting out of that, he said, was not an option.

As she was leaving the following Sunday morning, they needed to have the party that weekend. They had already made rough plans to go out to the Hamptons that Friday and Saturday, so Castle decided to plan the whole event into one giant celebration. He invited all her female friends he could get ahold of to a Saturday evening bash at his estate. The women could think of this as a combination bachelorette party and wedding shower and bring presents accordingly if they so choose. Otherwise, they could just show up and be prepared for some mildly naughty entertainment.

"I cannot believe you hired a male stripper; you should have your man card revoked for that," Javier commented with disgust the moment he heard the party's itinerary. For obvious reasons, the boys were not joining the Hampton's crowd for the weekend. He had, however, managed to talk them into helping him collect the gift baskets for the women in attendance and load them into his car.

"It's not like I'm staying for the show." Castle rationalized. "I'm playing bartender for the first hour and then as soon as that dude slips on his G-string I'm out."

"Well just in case you change your mind, be sure to have plenty of singles in your wallet," Kevin said as he hefted the final box into the trunk of Castle's Mercedes.

While Javier snorted with laughter, Castle shot the smaller man a glare.

* * *

By Saturday afternoon, Castle no longer recognized his home. The elegant beachfront estate normally decorated with white furniture and soft hues of blue and yellow was now adored with more phallic shaped decorations than he could even count. It was on some level deeply disturbing, but as he had never attended or planned a bachelorette party before, he was taking a "When in Rome…" attitude towards the situation. Plus, he knew everything would be back to normal soon.

Castle could not fully take credit for the debauchery about to take place in his home. During his forty-eight hours of planning, he had consulted Lanie, Javier's ex-wife and Kate's wildest friend. At least, the wildest friend of hers he knew well enough to converse with about penis-shaped cakes. As with everything she did, Lanie became very excited about the prospect of decorations and party favors, so much so that Castle had to calm her down. While Kate might get a chuckle at some phallic drinking cups and roll her eyes but be a good sport about a penis cake, he knew matching five foot blow up penis statues at the entrance to his home would push her over the edge.

"Well Darling, you certainly have outdone yourself," his mother, Martha, commented on walking into the fully decorated space. She was staying in the home that weekend in addition to Kate, William, and Kevin's wife Jenny. As that many guests filled his home, the other bachelorette attendees were staying at the home of one of Kate's friends a few blocks away.

As was her way, Martha had more or less invited herself to Kate's bash. Castle was initially uncertain that having a parent at the party would spoil the fun (though calling his mother a parent was admittedly a stretch of the term) but Kate insisted she didn't mind. As she put it: his mother knew how to have one hell of a good time, and Kate imagined this factor would only increase when strippers and alcohol were involved.

To show her gratitude that she was not forced out by way of her son banning her from his home for the weekend, Martha volunteered to take Kate out of the house for the afternoon so that she could be surprised by the decorations. Once again Castle felt the need to step in as any more than one hour of one-on-one time with Martha Rodgers could be qualified as too much, but Kate insisted it was fine. His mother was, after all, taking her for a manicure and massage.

"Is it too much?" Castle questioned with a grimace, craning his neck to see just how far behind his mother Kate was approaching. Maybe if she walked slow enough he had a few free seconds to rip down the penis lights lining the edge of the bar.

"It's…something," Martha commented as her wide eyes scanned the room. "But a girl only has one bachelorette party, right?"

"Well unless she's you," he commented. His mother smacked his arm playfully. A moment later, Kate stepped into the entry way.

"Dear god." She stopped dead and dropped her purse from her well-manicured hand.

Castle grimaced. "Too many penises?"

Her jaw hanging limp, Kate shook her head dumbly. "Where did you get all this stuff?"

"A really disturbing party store. Plus, Lanie contributed some. Evidently she's frequently involved in bachelorette parties…" As Castle watched her scan the room with mixed horror, he quickly added, "I can take some of it down."

She turned to him, a smile on her face (though he suspected it may have been forced on some level). "No, no it's fine; the girls will love it. I'm just glad William isn't here to see it."

 _Ah yes,_ Castle thought to himself, _the stick-in-the-mud would loathe this, wouldn't he?_ From the moment he arrived in the Hamptons, William had made it abundantly clear that he wanted absolutely zero involvement in Kate's "hen night" as it was called in the UK. The moment Kate and Martha went out the door, so did he along with his laptop, bound for a quiet coffee shop to work on a paper with a subject so boring Castle did not retain it.

"Well you can go ahead up to your room and change—your penis dress is waiting."

"My WHAT?!" Kate shrieked at him.

Castle laughed. "Kidding. I truly hope there isn't such a thing, though given what I've seen from those bachelorette party websites…there probably is. Fair warning: I think Lanie has some dick-shaped hat she's going to try to get you to wear."

"Great," Kate grumbled.

* * *

Ninety minutes later the party was in full swing. All the girls had arrived. The caterers were passing out food and the stripper had arrived a few minutes earlier. Castle preformed one last check to make sure each woman had a full drink in her hand before returning to the kitchen and pulling off his tacky sequin-covered bow tie. (Much to the disappointment of Kate's friends, he had left his shirt on so as not to go full Chippendale; he'd leave that to the man with the g-string.)

Just as he was making sure the refrigerator was stocked with enough water and booze to last the evening, a distinct throat clearing caught his attention. Glancing towards the hall he saw Kate, her eyes searching his nervously as she chewed on her bottom lip. Though he had seen her several times in the prior hour, it never failed to amuse him how absolutely absurd she looked in the princess tiara and pink sash Lanie forced on her once she refused the penis hat.

"Hey…did you need something? I was on my way out but…"

"Yeah, uh, just had a question," she said, taking a step towards him. "You're probably more familiar with strippers than I am but…are they supposed to be fully nude?"

"WHAT?!" Castle bellowed before hurrying towards the main sitting room of the home, taking the corner into the hall so quickly he needed to use both palms flat against it to keep from crashing. Upon stepping around the corner to the open space, Castle's eyes first fell on the bare ass of Hans, their male entertainment for the night. When the performer turned to gyrate his junk in the face of his mother, Castle felt his stomach lurch in his gut. He wasn't sure what was most disturbing: the fact that the stripper was, as Kate said, fully nude or the fact that his mother was cheering equally as loud as if not louder than the other guests.

* * *

Shortly before midnight that night Castle stepped out onto the back deck of his beach home, glass of scotch in hand, and let out a long, well-deserved exhale. All the party guests were finally gone along with the caterers and stripper (thank god!), the decorations were partially taken down and everything was reasonably put back together; the rest could wait until morning. The evening certainly had not turned out exactly as he expected but, hey, at least they had a damn good story.

As he took a sip from his glass he heard a soft, "Do the penis ice cubes taste better than regular ones?" from across the deck. He turned his head to see a smirking Kate sitting on a chaise lounge, her legs tucked underneath her, blanket wrapped around her shoulders.

"They do, actually." He joked before approaching. "Thought you went to bed."

She shook her head. "Was afraid I'd have nightmares."

"I know I will." He returned, shivering at the memory of what his poor eyes had witnessed earlier that night. Despite Castle requesting that the stripper keep the evening R-rated instead of X-rated, he was outvoted by Kate's squealing girlfriends and thus the man continued his show in the buff.

Castle took a seat on the bottom edge of Kate's chaise lounge and looked over at her. "Guess I kind of made a mess of things, didn't I?"

She let out a breathy laugh. "Actually, in a way, it was hilarious. And your mother certainly enjoyed it." No question existed in Kate's mind; Martha Rodgers had the most fun of all of them.

He gulped as his stomach jolted again. "Jesus, don't remind me."

"Where did you find that guy, anyway?"

"Lanie," he confessed with a slight grumble.

Kate let out a louder laugh. "Oh then she was definitely playing you; she probably knew he'd go Full Monte."

He sighed into his drink. "Great."

After a moment of silence, Kate said, "Thanks for the party Castle. I really needed it."

His brow rose. "This? Really?"

She smiled. "Well, I'm not going to lie—the evening would have been better with slightly less penis in it, but yeah, this. It was a good goodbye."

At the final word in her statement Castle sat up a bit straighter. "Goodbye?"

She leaned forward and wrung he hands together. "Castle…for the fall semester…"

"You're spending it in England," he concluded sadly. Well, that was definitely a blow and as far as Castle was concerned a "worst case scenario." If she was, in fact, going through with the wedding, which remained to be seen. But if she was planning on the wedding—which clearly she was—did that mean she had already told Columbia she would not be returning that fall? And what about her apartment? Would she sublet while she was away?

Before any of those questions could be answered, Kate replied, "Cairo, actually."

Castle nearly choked. "Cairo!? What the hell is in Cairo?"

"William has a position there—it's temporary, but we could be there for as long as a year. That's why we wanted to get married so quickly; because he has to move on August twentieth to be there in time for the start of the year."

"I…ah…wow…ah, wow." Castle stammered in the face of this monumental news. Gazing over at her in the dim light he couldn't think of a single thing to say. Of all the wedding bombshells, this was definitely the largest.

"I know I should have told you sooner; I just didn't know how," she confessed. Then, she kissed his cheek and thanked him again for the party before tip-toeing her way inside, leaving Castle sitting speechless in the near darkness listening to the distant waves crash against the sand.


	9. Chapter 9

_**A/N: Please see the bottom of this chapter for an important note regarding the future of this story.**_

* * *

 **Chapter Nine**

This, Castle decided early in the morning after the bachelorette party as he lie awake staring at the ceiling, was the final straw. Kate was not getting married. Kate was not going to Cairo. No matter what it cost him, no matter what it took he was going to stop the wedding. The stakes had risen and it was time Castle upped his game. Thus, he pulled out his secret weapon.

William did not like baseball. Castle knew this, he was not sure Kate did, but he knew of one way to make it abundantly clear: by taking them to a Mets' game.

For Kate, Mets' games were lifeblood. Castle would never forget the pure joy written all over her face when she first sat in his field box seats between third base and home plate. Evidently, game attendance in her youth had been in the outfield or once on the upper levels nearer to first base, but never once had she had seats that good. He doubted children were happier on Christmas morning than Kate was at that exact moment. Each subsequent time she used his season tickets, whether with him or with her father, she seemed to retain the same amount of joy.

Inviting William to a Mets' game would surely show Kate just how wrong they were for each other. He would undoubtedly be miserable. Better yet, she would see him being miserable and they would realize they simply weren't meant to be together.

Castle's plan for William's annihilation was complicated at best. First, he needed to set the scene correctly and make sure it wasn't too obvious he was simply setting William up to be miserable. He could have just given his pair of season tickets to them, but where was the fun in that? He needed to be there to witness whatever transpired (and nudge it along if need be). When the boys heard of his plans, they wanted to go as well. Figuring they'd make a party of it, Castle invited Kate's father to the Tuesday night game, but he was unable to attend due to a prior commitment.

In his search for five tickets, Castle originally considered selling his two and purchasing five in a row elsewhere in the stadium, but he saw the three seats almost immediately behind his were available and snatched them up without second thought. This, he decided, was kismet; he, Kevin and Javier would literally have front row seats to William and Kate breaking up. It was going to be great!

Castle's golden plans began to tarnish slightly when they arrived at the ballpark to discover the humidity level rivaled that of tropical rainforests. Castle jested, "At least it isn't raining."

"Don't think that would make a difference; I'm already soaked," Kevin commented as he mopped his brow with the sleeve of his t-shirt.

Despite the fact that sweat rolled down the back of his shirt and into the waist band of his khaki shorts, Castle could not be angry about the weather. The game was not going to be rained out, which was a positive. Plus, it appeared William did not own a pair of shorts. Or, at least, had not brought one with him, and thus was sweating the most of all of them. Perfect.

While everyone took their seats, Kate insisted the first round of beers was on her; this would be her last Mets game for a while and she wanted to start the celebration off right. As far as he was aware, Castle was the only one who knew she would be spending the fall (and possibly even the spring) in Egypt. She had requested his confidentiality in the matter and, though he wasn't entirely sure why, he agreed. As far as Kevin and Javier knew, she was spending the fall semester in England.

Despite the first inning being rather dull with the Mets getting three strikes off three hits and their opponents for the night, the Nationals, doing the same, the second inning began to pick up. Plus, a light breeze began to skirt through the crowd and while it did not entirely change the humidity level, it did make everyone feel better.

At the top of the third, Castle took everyone's dinner order. Much to his surprise, William volunteered to help him with the load. They climbed their way up to the concessions area at Citi Field in silence. Once elbowing their way through the tightly packed space, Castle asked William, who had previously been unsure of what he wanted to eat, "What are ya thinkin'? What looks good I mean?"

"Truthfully? None of it."

Castle briefly scrunched his nose. Ballpark food wasn't gourmet, he'd admit to that, but there were some legitimate eateries. Not everything was over-cooked hotdogs and nachos with abnormally colored cheese of questionable origin. "Burger? Taco? Sausage?" Castle listed the various options he thought might appeal to the Brit. Ultimately, he agreed to a duplicate of Kate's order: a Shakeburger from the Shake Shack; however the expression on his face made it seem as though he'd been tricked into eating lunch in the elementary school cafeteria on "tuna surprise" day.

"Are you at least enjoying the game?" Castle asked as they made their way back to the seats, each of them loaded down with bags of food.

"Not particularly. I suppose I'll never be as big of a baseball fan as Kate."

"Well, that would be difficult," Castle said with a laugh. "Are you a fan of any sports?"

William shook his head. "No, I never have been. My family enjoys polo; my brother's played for many years but I'm allergic to horses."

"So no polo for you." Castle concluded.

* * *

Forty minutes later, after they'd filled their bellies with food that was greasy and satisfying in all the best ways, the atmosphere had cooled significantly. The humidity was still near the maximum, but with the temperature itself dropping, the air became more tolerable. Just as Castle was beginning to wonder if his plan had backfired completely, he heard Kate say, "What? Of course we're staying to the end."

Hearing the irritation in her tone caused Castle to nearly leap from his seat with joy. He roughly elbowed Javier, who sat beside him. When he received a glare, he frantically pointed his finger at the near-boiling-point couple seated in front of them. Javier's brow wrinkled with confusion, so Castle curled his fingers into claws and bared his teeth as though he was growling. Then, he pointed again. Bizarre as it was, his miming worked and, after nudging Kevin, the trio leaned in to listen closer to the discussion taking place.

"…Well, I'm sorry if you're not enjoying it, but this is something I love."

"I just don't understand the appeal; it's so silly and boring."

"I'm not saying you have to love it as much as I do, but can you please try not to be completely miserable?"

"I-" William stopped abruptly when, from the corner of his eye, he caught the sight behind him: three grown men listening like schoolgirls. When they realized William was on to them, the trio leaned back in their seats casually and pretended to be fascinated with the events on the field. Unfortunately for them, no action was happening as the next batter had yet to take his place.

"Perhaps we should continue this discussion in private?" William suggested.

Kate glanced back behind her and, though every one of them avoided her eye contact, she knew they had been listening. Silently, she stood and followed her fiancé up the steps, away from her nosy friends.

Once they were out of earshot, Castle hissed to his seatmates, "They're fighting! They're fighting over him hating baseball!" Really, he should have been ashamed over his gleeful tone, but he wasn't; he was too excited.

"Looks like you called this one, bro; good job," Javier said, leaning back further in his seat.

"Hate to be the voice of reason, but just because they had a disagreement does not mean they're breaking up," Kevin said wisely.

"No, I know." Castle promised. "I didn't expect them to breakup at this exact moment. The point of this was to create even more underlying reasons why they're not good for each other. That way-aaayyy Kate!" Castle changed the course of his speech quickly when the brunette returned to her seat—alone.

When she acknowledged him with nothing more than a grumble, he couldn't help but ask, "Did you and William have a fight?"

She glanced at him over her shoulder. "I wouldn't call it a fight. We…we agreed we need to be more respectful and tolerate each other's different interest, but that may not always mean _participating_ in each other's interests."

Castle arched an eyebrow. "Meaning?"

"Meaning I don't think William will be coming to too many more Mets games."

Castle nodded briefly. "So he left, then?"

"What? No," she responded quickly. "He's in the bathroom."

With an exhale, Castle leaned back in his seat. Well…that hadn't gone as planned. Then again, he mused, the conclusion to their disagreement was very rational— _very_ rational. This was bound to come up again at a later time. The seeds had definitely been planted, but maybe they were not as rooted as he hoped.

"Rick?"

Castle was pulled from his thoughts when the Brit returned. Instead of sitting next to Kate, he stood in front of his seat, facing the trio of men in the upper row. At the sound of his name, the writer looked up.

"It's been brought to my attention that I've been ungrateful and I apologize for that. All the noise and music plus this bloody heat has given me a headache and I've forgotten myself. You've been nothing but kind and generous to us over the past two weeks and I am grateful for everything you've done."

"O-Oh," Castle stammered; he had not been expecting such an elegant apology. "Well, sure. No problem. Anything for Kate…and Kate's fiancé." He added with a forced smile.

 _Well damn_ , he thought to himself once William had taken his seat. He wanted to hate William. He _needed_ to hate William. So why was William being so damn nice? That made him so much more difficult to hate. If William continued to be this nice and Castle continued to hate him in spite of it that made him a dick, but he wasn't supposed to be the dick; William was!

For the remainder of the game, Castle sat and sulked in his seat, not wanting to make eye contact with anyone. This was his grand plan—his Hail Mary—and it failed. What the heck was he supposed to do now? Kate and William were leaving for England in five days! The wedding was in ten days! Castle was running out of time.

As they exited the park after what turned out to be an only so-so game (the Nationals had bested the Mets 6-5), they were discussing how baseball had not jumped to the top of William's favorite sports list. In fact, it probably hadn't cracked the top five.

"So William what are you gonna do if your kid wants to play little league?" Kevin asked.

"Oh I don't think that'll be a problem," William replied. "Our children won't have time for sports—they'll be focusing on academics and if they need something else—music."

Castle's ears perked at this latest opportunity for dissention. Though as far as he knew she had not been a huge sports player in her youth, Castle always knew Kate to be adamant about allowing any hypothetical future children to follow their own dreams. Her parents had encouraged her when she chose to follow a different career path than them and felt it fundamentally helped her be who she was. William's opinion seemed to differ on that front.

"No sports?" Javier asked. "What if they want to play…cricket or something?"

William shrugged. "I wouldn't forbid them from playing, but I hope they take a different interest."

Javier allowed the couple to walk ahead while he muttered to the two remaining men, "Well I know what uncle Javi is getting them for every birthday."

"Gloves, bats, and balls?" Castle asked.

"You know it." He replied before bumping his fist against Castle's.

Despite the brief hope he gained when William's opinion of their children's futures came up, that glimmer faded as they made their way to the subway. Kate walked with her arm linked through Williams, her head often resting against his shoulder when the crowd of people walking came to a near standstill. At one point, they even shared an extremely rare public kiss on the lip—the first Castle had seen from them.

Watching them, his stomach beginning to swirl, Castle felt the unpleasant sensation of guilt creeping up his spine. What was he doing? Was breaking up Kate and William the complete wrong thing to do? Or did it not only make him the worst maid of honor ever, but the worst best friend ever as well?

Only after they parted ways with the couple did Castle express this to his comrades. "Maybe…maybe I should stop all this," he concluded.

"What? Give up? No way!" Javier insisted.

"But maybe it's for the best. Maybe I'm not what she wants. I can't give her brooding intellectual discussions; I can't give her a fancy academic life in—a foreign country," he said, stopping himself just short of accidentally saying, "Cairo."

"But what if she doesn't want that?" Javier countered. "What if she wants a life here, in New York?"

Castle gave his friend a rather pitiful look. "But you saw them. She seemed so…happy." He spoke the final word as if it was poison. Above all else, he wanted Kate to be happy—truly he did, but up until that moment he fundamentally believed her ultimate happiness lie with him. Now, he wasn't so sure.

"After they had the fight, you mean," Javier pointed out. Castle's look remained skeptical. "Okay, tell me this—have you seen her laugh?"

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"Has he made her laugh?" Javier repeated his question.

Castle thought for a moment. "No, not that I've seen."

Javier simply shrugged. "So maybe he's not what she needs." At Castle's confused expression he added, "All I know is you and Kate have been friends for a decade – there has to be a reason for that."

Javier was right and that gave Castle his final idea. Instead of breaking down William in her eyes, he needed to build himself up. He needed to shower her that he was head-and-shoulders above the rest; that he was the end-all-be-all of best friends; that _he_ was the one she needed and absolutely couldn't live without.

* * *

 _A/N: After some significant thought, I have decided to end this story. Quite frankly, it just isn't fun for me to post anymore. Actually, I completely dread it, because I know the negative reviews will outweigh the positive ones and I will continue to get nasty guest reviews for the duration._

 _It's a shame because I like this story and I stand by how it's written, but it's become clear that a large portion of others disagree. Many people hate this version of Kate and don't see any friendship or relationship between her and Castle, but I disagree. A lot of people see hardly any similarities between this Castle & Kate and the canon versions. I'd be more inclined to agree on that front, but I would also like to remind those people that its an AU and as calling it such I can write the characters any way I see fit._

 _Nevertheless, a large portion of the readers and I will just have to agree to disagree._

 _So as not to punish those enjoying the story, I will post the remaining 7 chapters all at once on Wednesday of this week. I apologize in advance for spamming your inboxes with update notifications._

 _Thank you for your understanding._


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter Ten**

For Castle, the fifty-eight hours between hopping on the subway after the baseball game Tuesday night and waking up Friday morning passed in the blink of an eye. How had they arrived at Kate's last weekday in Manhattan—her last weekday in America!—so quickly? He needed more time! Worse yet, he had not seen Kate during any of that time; they had only exchanged sporadic text messages.

Though Castle was more than willing to spend every waking hour with Kate if that became necessary to win her over from William, he could not blame her for being otherwise occupied. She was, after all, trying to plan a wedding in a different country. Plus, she was spending time with her father, her other family members, and her friends. As much as he wanted to completely monopolize her time, he could not be mad at her when she turned down his dinner invitation to go and share a meal with her aunt and cousin, who were unable to make the trip abroad for the ceremony.

But Friday—Friday was Castle's day. At least, he intended for it to be his day. They were meeting up for his maid of honor clothing fitting at ten (mercifully, he was wearing a formal suit instead of the dress Kate jokingly suggested) and Castle had every intention of suggesting _Ruby's_ for lunch. Though it wasn't the same as going on Sunday for brunch, _Ruby's_ did allow ordering from their breakfast menu all day, so they could make it brunch if they so choose. (Castle, however, could now allow himself to dwell on the concept that their meal at _Ruby's_ could be their last for a long while; that notion was too sad to bear.)

Friday morning after picking up coffees for himself and Kate and (somewhat begrudgingly) a tea for William, Castle met the couple in front of the tailor where he would be purchasing the morning dress he needed to attend Kate and William's formal wedding. Being a well-educated, worldly man, Castle had seen many pictures from weddings across the pond in which men wore morning dress, but he didn't realize that virtually _all_ weddings in England used them as tradition—not just royal ones. Castle owned many suits and two tuxedos but as his closet was void of morning coats, vests and striped pants off to the tailor they went.

"Wow Castle," Kate said when she first saw him dressed in his new pants and coat. Though they were still too large, they fit well enough for her to get a good view of him. "That's certainly…different."

Castle scrunched his forehead as he reached down with his left hand and pulled out one of the tails. "I feel like I'm going to get these caught on things."

"You won't." William assured him. "You'll just need to be careful when you sit down."

A few minutes later, after the tailor had finished with part of the jacket, Castle turned so he could finish the rest. In doing so, he spotted Kate looking at him with a bemused expression, though she tried to hide it with her coffee cup conveniently placed in front of her lips. "What?" he asked her. "Too weird?"

She shook her head. "No, just different. Very…formal."

He arched an eyebrow at her. "Are you implying that I normally dress informally?"

"Oh I'm not implying; I know you do." He gasped dramatically and she rolled her eyes. "Please, Castle. When was the last time you didn't write in your pjs. Or, worse! Your underwear?"

Castle opened his mouth to protest, but then shut it again; she had him pretty well pegged as the last time he'd opened his laptop he had, indeed, been in his boxers and t-shirt, which were both his underwear and his pajamas. "Okay, well what if I wear this _over_ my underwear—I could start a new fashion trend."

While Kate let out a breathy laugh and shook her head, William's brow wrinkled; he clearly had not understood the joke. Castle didn't care about that one bit; all that mattered to him was that he had made Kate laugh. True, it was not a full-bellied laugh, but a laugh was a laugh, and that was certainly more than he'd seen from William in their brief time together.

* * *

An hour later, Castle was done with his fitting. As he had paid for express service, his jacket and pants would be ready on Monday, just in time for them to be picked up and carried with him to London. Though Kate expressed doubts as to whether or not the garments would be completed on time Castle assured her that everything would be fine; there was nothing to worry about.

Out on the sidewalk Castle proposed his idea for lunch at _Ruby's_. He was so eager to spend more time with Kate he didn't even care if William joined them. (Well, he _cared_ but time with William and Kate was better than time with neither, so he compromised.)

"I'm sorry, Castle," she told him. "I have to go to my final dress fitting."

"Right, which is my cue to leave," William said. Then, after kissing Kate's cheek, he shook Castle's hand and walked out to the street to hail a cab back to Kate's apartment.

"Are you going by yourself?" Castle asked.

Kate shrugged. "Sure, why not? Lanie and Jenny were with me when I picked the dress; they don't need to come back. My dad offered to come, but I know he just did that because he feels guilty my mom isn't here, but there's no reason he needs to suffer."

"I'll come with you."

Kate laughed at her silly but sweet maid of honor. "That's very kind of you Castle, but did you hear the part about suffering? No need for you to be subjected to that."

"I don't mind." He offered her a smile that was genuine. Truly, he didn't. Okay, so perhaps this was not his ideal way of spending the rest of Friday, but hanging out with Kate and not Kate-and-William? He'd take it any way it came!

"Castle! I'm going to be trying on wedding dresses!"

Though her tone was clearly meant to discourage, it did not affect his decision in the slightest. "Not technically. Technically you've already picked the dress and you're just trying it on again to make sure it fits. I'll be fine; I promise."

After staring him down for another minute, Kate shrugged, giving up, and then lead the way towards the closest subway station.

Though Castle would not traditionally have had a large interest in wedding dresses, he did have an interest in Kate. Thus, when she told him the "saga" (her term) of her wedding dress the afternoon after her bizarre bachelorette party he had listened and retained a reasonable amount of knowledge.

Since Kate needed her wedding dress so quickly, she needed to purchase one that was readily available in the store. Most wedding dresses, she informed him, needed to be ordered several months in advance, but clearly she did not have the luxury. This was alright, though, because many of the available dresses were discounted, which pleased her already limited budget.

The day before her bachelorette party, she and her two girlfriends had gone on a pilgrimage to several bridal boutiques in the city before they'd found a suitable gown. Upon hearing her tight timeframe, many of the sales clerks laughed at her before dismissing her towards their meager selection. Kate did not have to find a dress that fit her perfectly, as it could be altered, but she had to get as close as she possibly could because there was not much time for the alterations to be done.

Ultimately, she was lucky enough to find a very elegant and expensive dress that a bride had ordered and put a fifty percent deposit on. When the bride canceled her wedding, she never picked up the dress. Thus, her bad luck turned into a blessing for Kate. While not a style she would have chosen on her own, Kate decided it was the best of all the options. Plus, it did fit her quite well; the waist and hips were nearly perfect though the bust did need to be taken in significantly.

"Oh, is this the groom? I hope not!" the bubbly seamstress said when Kate and Castle stepped into the alterations section of the bridal salon.

"No he's the maid of honor." Kate informed the woman. Naturally thinking Kate was joking, the seamstress laughed, but Castle corrected her.

"Actually she's serious; I'm the maid of honor. Technically: the best friend."

"Oh well…okay!" she said, throwing up her hands. Then, she pulled Kate's purse from her grasp, handed it to Castle, and then disappeared with the bride-to-be behind the nearest curtain.

His brow wrinkled, Castle looked around the immediate area, unsure of what to do for a few moments, but then ultimately decided to sit on a chair against the wall a few feet away. He placed Kate's purse on the floor just beside his right foot and pulled his cell phone out of his pocket for entertainment while he waited.

After answering a few emails and checking Twitter for any interesting posts, Castle was unsure of how much time had passed until he heard the squeak of metal-on-metal signaling the curtain Kate disappeared behind had now opened. Castle looked up and, in his shock, jerked his hands, causing his phone to fly loose. He fumbled with it frantically before finally letting it slip through his fingertip, where it landed on the floor with a "thunk." Castle took little notice of this; he was mesmerized by the creature before him.

Made of off-white satin, Kate's strapless gown had beaded floral accents across the bodice and down to the drop-waist where it flowed into a long skirt with a small train. Across her shoulders and down her arms almost to the elbow, was a lace shawl adored with floral accents that matched the dress. She wore no makeup and her hair was pulled into a messy knot at the crown of her head but neither of those things detracted from her beauty in Castle's opinion; she was stunning.

"Castle?"

"I, uh, I." He stammered as he scooped his phone up from the floor. "You're…wow. Gorgeous."

She pursed her lips as she examined her reflection in the mirror. She rolled her shoulders and rotated twenty degrees to the right, then back to the center. She brought her hands up to cup her breasts overtop the dress. Her hands clasping loose fabric, she said to the seamstress, "I think it's still a little big here."

The seamstress nodded and set to work taking in the bust. Using her reflection in the mirror, Kate looked back at Castle. "Honestly, the girl that ordered this must have had huge breast implants; that's the only explanation!"

"Right." Castle laughed breathily, though truthfully he hadn't heard what she said; he was still amazed by how she looked in a wedding dress. A wedding dress!

Dear god—Kate was getting married! _Married!_

Castle understood the concept of being engaged, but as he had been so focused on ending the engagement before it actually reached the wedding, he failed to fully process all the details that weddings usually included. Flowers, bands, tuxedos: this all made sense to him, but sitting there in the fitting room of _Dream Brides_ it hit him like a bouquet of flowers to the face.

Kate was getting married and… it wasn't to him!

Christ, how had he been so blind!

His chest began to heave and his hands felt clammy and he was convinced he would have a full scale panic attack right then and there. Fortunately, Kate was too distracted with the woman affixing straight pins to her chest to notice her friend's pallid expression.

In that moment it hit him and Castle had no idea why he hadn't seen it before. This wasn't just about breaking up her engagement to William so that he could date Kate. This was about breaking up Kate's wedding so he could be with Kate—be with her for the long term. Be with her and eventually marry her.

Castle had never seen it more clearly than in that exact moment. He wanted—no, needed—her to be with him. He wanted that moment where he stood in front of an altar and looked back a long row of seats to see her approaching, a vision in white, knowing that from that moment forward they would live their lives together, never to be separated.

"Castle?"

Kate's voice startled him and he stammered out a few incoherent syllables. Only then did she notice her friend looking a bit ill. She asked if he was alright, but he assured her he was fine. "Okay, well, I just wanted to know what you thought of this," she said, gesturing towards her sleeves.

"What? Ah, it looks…fine. Nice. I…why?"

"That's one of the reasons why I picked this dress," she explained. "I have to have my shoulders covered for the wedding and most of the dresses available are strapless or, at most, have thin straps, but that's not enough. I just…I don't love the lace." With a wrinkled brow, she turned back to the mirror, obviously displeased.

Castle stood from his seat and stepped up behind her. "You look beautiful, Kate. Absolutely stunning. The man you marry will be speechless," he said, purposely avoiding using the groom's name.

She gave him a satisfied smile. "Thanks Castle."

Just then, the seamstress returned and assured Kate the alterations could be done—but not before Tuesday.

"Tuesday!" she squeaked, wringing her hands together. "But I leave _Sunday!_ "

"But I leave Tuesday," Castle said simply. He turned to the seamstress. "Can it be ready before noon?" When she nodded, he turned back to the bride. "See, its fine. I'll just pick it up before I leave."

Kate stepped forward and gripped Castle's arm with surprising strength. "Castle, oh my god, are you sure? Because I don't…I…I'm not sure if-"

"Kate," he began in a smooth, calming tone. "Don't worry. I promise you that your dress will make it safe and sound to England. I am the maid of honor, right?"

She laughed with relief and flung her arms around his neck. "You are _the best_ maid of honor in the world."

He laughed as he hugged her back, ignoring as best he could the warm feel of her breath against his neck. "I'm not sure if I should be proud or ashamed of that."

* * *

Fifteen minutes later, Kate was back in her regular clothing as she and Castle walked back out onto the streets of New York where he invited her to lunch for a second time. Once again, she turned him down.

"I'm sorry Castle, really. I'd love to have one last _Ruby's_ brunch with you, but I'm really swamped."

Though it pained his heart, he forced a smile across his face. "I understand. Totally."

She thanked him and patted his arm gently. Before they separated, he could not stop from asking, "Are you happy, Kate?"

She let out an unexpectedly loud laugh. "I'm…losing my mind, completely overwhelmed, stressed out, going on little sleep, and about to leave the country for an undetermined amount of time."

"Yeah, but I mean are you happy with William? You love him, right?" He had to know. He had to hear her say it.

If she professed her undying love for her fiancé would it deter him in his quest to end their engagement? Not at all. He still wanted her to be with him, but the masochistic side of him wanted to know what he was up against.

"I…" Her voice drifted off as she gazed distantly off into the street. After several moments she turned back to him and said, "I'll be happy once we're married and on our honeymoon. Until then, I'm just trying to survive without becoming bridezilla."

"Right, sure. We wouldn't want that." He teased. She then gave him a quick peck on the cheek before hurrying to the nearest intersection where she could cross. As he watched her go, Castle thought about the fact that she hadn't said that she loved William. Without that official confirmation he had to believe there was still a chance for them; there was still hope.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter Eleven**

Very early Wednesday morning, Castle could not help but let out an involuntary moan as he stepped out of Heathrow Airport. Though he'd traveled on all-night flights to Europe before, he had forgotten just how grueling they could be. Thanks to some over-the-counter sleeping pills, he had been able to get a few hours in, but they weren't enough and by that point the pills were just aiding in his grogginess. He needed coffee. Except—shit—he was in the land of tea drinkers, wasn't he? Well, there had to be a Starbucks somewhere.

As Castle rode to his hotel, he skimmed through his email, pausing on the itinerary Kate had sent him. His maid of honor duties were in full swing now that the wedding was just a few days away. A few days—just over eighty hours.

When Castle set out on his journey to convince his best friend that she was marrying the wrong man, he did not except to get this close to the wedding without convincing her to break off her engagement. He was sure he only needed a week, possibly a little longer. Yet, there he sat, in a foreign country, not quite three weeks after learning of Kate's engagement; the wedding still on.

Why the hell did she have to get married so damn quickly anyway? He, of course, knew the reason why. Though she never said, he suspected Kate would be alright with moving with William to Cairo if they were just engaged—possibly even if they were just dating. William, on the other hand, was not comfortable with premarital cohabitation. If they were going to be together, he'd explained during their last meal together in the states, they needed to be together in the legal sense. Stupid William; running all his plans! But now it all came down to these final three days.

In a way, it made sense. As a writer, Castle found that he did his best work under pressure—at the absolute cusp of a deadline. In the weeks leading up to his deadlines, he would sit at his computer for hours doing nothing but searching YouTube and dozens of other websites invented solely to waste time. Yet, suddenly, at the eleventh hour he was able to hon in and complete the chapters on time. This, he hoped, was exactly how he would approach the wedding. Fortunately, as the maid of honor, he had plenty of opportunities to do so.

Per Kate's schedule, Castle was to report to the Fitzgerald residence promptly at six p.m. to dine with Kate, William, William's parents and William's brother, Edmund. Though Castle initially protested his invitation upon what appeared to be a family event, Kate informed him that, really, he could think of it as a wedding party dinner as Edmund was his brother's best man. The only missing member of the group would be Kate's father who, due to a preexisting work commitment, would not be arriving until the following afternoon.

Though Castle planned on skimming through the rest of his itinerary and finding opportunities to talk Kate out of marrying the foreigner, the nice soft bed in his hotel room was calling his name, so he gave in to his body's desire for a nap; there would be plenty of time for plotting after he awoke.

* * *

Just before six Castle arrived at the fancy London home of the Fitzgerald family. Though impressive looking with a stone exterior and large windows, Castle did not find the residence welcoming at all. Stepping inside the foyer, his suspicions were confirmed further when he found himself surrounded by dark colored flooring and wood paneled walls adorned with ancient seeming artifacts. Impressive, yes; cozy and welcoming, no. Then again, he supposed, the décor seemed to match the personality of the residents quite well.

"Castle!"

The quite hiss of his friend pulled his attention from the ancient looking painting of a stern-faced man wearing many military commendations to that of an elegantly dressed woman. She wore the same navy gown she'd worn to his mother's wedding in the spring. Back before this whole mess was started. Her hair and jewelry were the same, but missing from her face was his favorite feature: her disarming smile.

Glancing down at his khaki pants and feeling wildly underdressed he hissed, "What are you wearing?"

"What are _you_ wearing?" she echoed. "I told you to dress for dinner."

"Yeah, dinner with William's folks not dinner with the queen!"

She groaned and rolled her eyes. "No, remember? I told you to dress _Downton Abbey_ style." She specifically remembered using the TV reference to drive her point home.

He blinked at her. "I thought you were kidding."

"Castle!"

"Oh c'mon it's not that bad. At least I have the blazer on," he said, tugging at the hem of his navy jacket.

She chewed on her bottom lip as she looked at him. "Maybe William has a tie you can wear…"

"I don't need a tie," Castle returned while thinking, _there's no way in hell I'm wearing one of his ties_. "Besides, wouldn't it be worse if we were late to dinner?"

Her brow rose as she considered this point. Ultimately, she agreed with a nod and walked over to smooth the shoulders of his slightly rumpled blazer with her hands. "Just be on your best behavior, ok?"

He twisted his lips to the side. "C'mon Kate—what do you think I'm going to do? Break out a whoopee cushion?" He was almost insulted at the insinuation. Yes, in the past, when they'd had dinners with Kevin and Javier he had pulled out a whoopee cushion (well, electronic fart machine) but he absolutely knew how to present a good image when he needed to and the last thing he wanted to do was embarrass Kate in the unlikely event that she did marry into the Fitzgerald family.

She groaned and dropped her forehead onto his shoulder. "God, I'm sorry. I know you wouldn't do that I'm just… I want this dinner to go well. That's all."

Castle sighed as he leaned his cheek against the top of her head and skimmed his hand gently across her back. "So," he asked as quietly as he could manage, "What kind of mother-in-law stereotype does Mrs. Fitzgerald fit? Crazy? Eccentric? Stick up her ass?"

"Castle!" She hissed, lifting her head so quickly she almost caught his jaw.

He smirked at her. "What? It's just a hunch, but I'm thinking it's not the 'warm and cuddly' type."

"Why do you say that?"

He blinked at her slowly as he spoke. "Because I know you and you're freaking out."

Kate sighed and looked around to make sure no one else was in earshot. "No, she's…she's fine. Nice."

Castle fought a laugh. "Mm no. Want to try again?"

She looked back at him, defeated. "She is nice—polite, I mean. I just…I can't tell if she doesn't like me or if we're still fighting the British-American cultural barrier."

Castle bobbed his head in understanding then pulled his blazer a bit straighter across his shoulders. "Okay, I got it—pretend like we're dining with The Queen. All P's and Q's will be minded."

Kate mouthed a thank you to him before hooking his elbow with her hand and pulling him towards the dining room where the Fitzgerald family awaited.

* * *

Castle was trying. Honest to god, he was trying. He genuinely did not want to mess up the dinner with Kate. Yes, he wanted to stop the wedding, but there was a time and a place for conversations like that, and that time and place was not in front of William's entire family. For Kate—and only for Kate—he intended to put on his best suave-and-debonair Richard Castle attitude. The only problem was it did not seem to be working.

For starters, Castle did not like the Fitzgerald's. True, he had only been in their presence for an hour's time and that judgement was probably unfair, but they were just…dull. Exceedingly dull. And, yes, it probably was in part attributed to what Kate had mentioned earlier—the British-American cultural barrier—but my god, were they dull!

William's parents—Charlotte and William Senior—were more or less as he expected: extremely proper and dripping with class. Castle felt as though a meal with them would also be a lesson in etiquette. Edmund, on the other hand, was just about as interesting as a brown paper bag. He had zero facial expressions, no voice inflection and barely looked at anyone when he spoke. Castle continually fought a yawn every time Edmund was the central focus of their meal.

With his career as a mystery writer, Castle considered himself to be a keen observer of those around him. He was good at reading people after years and years of practice. It only took him about five minutes at the Fitzgerald dining table to realize that while the family was proud of both their sons the elder Edmund was the shining star. He thought Mrs. Fitzgerald would run out of breath listing his degrees, awards and accommodations. (Castle had foolishly tried to compare himself with a shared bachelor's in literature and journalism, to the illustrious career of Edmund, who was apparently Britain's foremost expert in something literature related so boring Castle failed to retain it.)

Though he was vaguely familiar with them, William's mother also rattled off her younger son's degrees before pointing out that Kate had plenty of time to catch up—perhaps she could even pursue another degree while in Cairo. Even Castle fought a flinch at the backhanded insult. In his mind, Kate's doctorate was something to be extremely proud of, but evidently Mrs. Fitzgerald disagreed; it was impressive, just not impressive enough.

Castle was surprised to see Kate respond with merely a demure smile and a continued focused attention on her meal, which she ate with the delicacy of a purebred mouse: one tiny nibble at a time. He knew for certain the Kate he had known for a decade must have been dying inside; ready to jump out of her skin and vehemently defend the years and years of her life she spent earning that degree.

As the evening continued, it was clear education would be an overarching theme in their conversations. At one point, Eaton College entered the discussion. Castle recognized the name as it had been discussed in the context of the royals that had attended it. In that sense, he knew the school to be prestigious, but did not know much else about it.

"It's a fantastic place for young men," William Senior said. "My father went there, I went there, my sons went there and their sons will, too."

"Isn't…isn't Eaton a boarding school?" Castle asked, his gaze drifting between the Williams.

Kate's fiancé nodded. "Is there something wrong with boarding schools?"

Castle shook his head before taking a sip of his wine. "No, not really I just…I didn't think Kate liked them." His eyes turned to his friend while he fought to keep his expression placid. Ah, an unanticipated opportunity to point out yet another reason why William and Kate weren't meant for each other. Well, he certainly wasn't going to turn down such a blatant opening, but in this case even more tact was required.

Under her friend's prying eye, Kate's focus remained on her dinner plate. As she did not respond, William did for her. "I'm sure if Kate said that she meant _American_ boarding schools." His tone indicated that boarding schools in America were akin to prisons or Wild West encampments, but Castle chose not to take the bait. "Eaton is one of the best schools in the country."

Castle smiled gently. "I have no doubt that they are academically superior, but that's not what I was talking about."

"Boarding schools are not just about the education, Mr. Castle," William's mother said, "but the experience; the atmosphere.

"Believe me, Mrs. Fitzgerald, I'm intimately familiar with the atmosphere of a boys' boarding schools; I attended one for several years in my youth and, from that experience, I learned that I would never send my children to a boarding school; they miss out on far too much."

In his pre-teen years, Castle had become a victim of his mother's career as a traveling actress. With her between husbands and his biological father nowhere to be found, Castle found himself shipped off to a boarding school so he could be cared after and educated while she was on the road. Though the quality of the education might have been superior to that of public schools in the city, Castle had spent so much time acting out to get attention (and in a fruitless attempt to be kicked out) he'd hardly taken advantage of it and was certain he would have fared better at home seeing his mother on a daily basis.

Unfazed by Castle's comments, Mrs. Fitzgerald continued. "A school like Eaton provides the absolute best opportunities."

"To be with family? Parents? Siblings? Grandparents?" the writer challenged. "How about going outside and throwing around a baseball with your father after dinner? Or the whole family curling up together on a rainy Saturday afternoon and watching cartoons or a movie. Or," Castle paused and locked eyes with Kate before saying, "Sunday morning brunch."

Castle saw her lips twitch and knew he'd struck a chord with her. Even better, he knew his comment would not register any strongly with the Fitzgerald family than anything else he said. Brunch didn't mean anything to them, but it did for Kate. Taking note of the fact that she looked away from him quickly he consider that moment his very first "win."

Mrs. Fitzgerald cleared her throat and sat up a bit straighter. "Tell me, Mr. Castle do you have much experience raising a family."

"I do not. I'm not married nor do I have children, but there's no harm in planning for the future."

"I see. So you do plan to marry?"

Castle bobbed his head. "Of course. I just have yet to find the right woman."

Despite herself, Kate let out a small laugh she attempted to pass off as a cough. Her attempt failed and earned her a snide look from her friend. "Something you'd like to share Kate?" he asked, forgetting momentarily whose presence they were in.

"No, nothing…but maybe if you want to get married you should try dating women with IQ's over 100."

Castle laughed. "Touché."

"From what I heard, Rick can be quite the scoundrel," William commented.

Castle's eyes shot towards the man. Insults from his best friend he would take. From the fiancé? No way in hell. Fortunately, William's mother stopped him before he could say anything too foolish or insulting by suggesting that topic was not appropriate conversation for dinner.

* * *

Half an hour later, the meal had taken a slight upturn. Though his few attempts to make William's family laugh had failed, he did manage to get a chuckle or two out of Kate, which he considered a success. Before the Fitzgerald's began to serve the dessert—er, "pudding"—Castle asked if he could be excused to the restroom. Surprisingly, Kate jumped out of her seat and offered to escort him.

"I can follow directions, you know," Castle commented on their way out of the dining room.

"You'd think that…but bathrooms are tucked weird places in old houses like these," she explained, leading him back a narrow hallway towards the kitchen. Castle could not help but think she might want a few minute break from the prying eyes and ears of the Brits. His suspicions were confirmed when he exited the bathroom and found her standing there.

"Afraid I'm going to steal the silverware?" he jested.

"No just…" She let out a defeated sigh. "They hate me don't they?"

"Hate's a strong word, Kate," he said pointedly. "But if you want my honest opinion: no I don't think they're exactly jumping for joy that you're marrying into the family. But hey you know what?" he added at her saddening expression. "I know they'll grow to love you because you're impossible not to love."

She let out a bitter laugh. "That's a lie, but I appreciate the effort."

As they turned another corner, Castle remained silently thankful that Kate had waited to lead him back; he had been turned around in the unfamiliar space. As they neared the entrance of the dining room, he could hear evidence of a conversation taking place. The closer they drew, the voice of William's mother became clearer.

"…It's not completely her fault. With her mother dying when she was young, being raised by her father—it's no wonder she's a little rough around the edges. That's just something you need to consider."

"I have considered, Mother and I-" William stopped abruptly when he realized his stone-faced fiancée stood in the doorway to the dining room. Awkwardly, he stood from the table and dropped his napkin onto his seat. He opened his mouth to speak, but before he could Kate hurried off so quickly towards the front of the house she nearly knocked Castle down in her haste.

When he righted himself, he took a step into the room and stared down each of the Brits. He had been polite long enough—he would not stand for them insulting his best friend, particularly not when they had the facts completely wrong.

"Actually, Kate's mother died when she was nineteen and, though she doesn't want to admit it, I know she's having a really hard time doing all of this without her mother here, so you might want to consider that next time you go to criticize."

For a solid minute they remained in silence before Castle turned to William and asked, "Aren't you going to go check on her?"

William's eyes widened and he looked as though Castle had just volunteered him to be that year's tribute in the Hunger Games. "Wh-what? Ah, she's fine. She'll be back in a minute."

Castle shook his head, completely disgusted. Of course William was the kind of man who didn't want to deal with the nitty-gritty. A crying woman? No thanks! She'll be fine on her own.

He took two steps in the direction Kate disappeared but then stopped and turned back. Not even caring about good impressions anymore he said, "You don't even deserve her."

* * *

After panicking for the first thirty second, completely uncertain of how he would find his friend in an expansive and unfamiliar home, Castle mercifully spotted a shadow on the front porch and headed out the door from which he entered. There, her arms folded tightly over her chest, Kate stood facing away from the front door. He approached her as though she was on the ledge of a ten story building.

Despite it being summer, Castle noted coolness in the air, so he took off his blazer and draped it gingerly around her shoulders. Once it rested against her skin, she snuck her hands up and pulled it tighter. Sniffing back tears she said, "I'm being stupid, I know."

"Never, Kate."

He heard her breath in sharply and she whipped her head back to look at him. Though the surprise on her face lasted only a moment, Castle realized she had initially thought he was William. As she was already upset, he refrained from pointing out that her fiancé thought she would be fine without being checked on.

Once Kate was full aware of her porch companion, she shook he head and took a step towards him. "I didn't realize how hard this would be without her."

"I know."

"My dad will be here tomorrow; that should help."

"Is there anything I can do…"

She offered him a fractured smile. "No I'm fine."

Despite her words, Castle knew she was anything but. He stepped forward, opened his arms, and she fell willingly into him. Though no more tears fell, she tucked her head beneath his chin and wrapped her arms around his waist. Castle skimmed his hands gently up and down her back knowing that he would hold her close for as long as she needed.


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

Richard Castle took a long drink from his Starbucks cup before letting out a long exhale. Okay, nine-thirty in the morning was not that early or that unreasonable of an hour for a Thursday. However, since it felt like four-thirty due to the time change, Castle felt he was going to need more than one cup of coffee to trudge through. In fact, he thought seven or eight ought to do it.

If Castle had his way, he would have lounged around his hotel room until at least ten or eleven. Even that wasn't a decent hour on East Coast time, but it was _closer_ , however his maid of honor duties precluded him from such desires. He needed to meet Kate outside a bakery promptly at nine-thirty—not a second later! At least, he thought with another sigh into his drink, he'd get some dessert out of the deal.

At nine-thirty-one a black taxi pulled up out front of the shop. Wearing jeans and a cranberry short-sleeved blouse, her hair in a ponytail, Kate stepped out, tipped the driver, and then approached her friend. "Look at us—on the streets of London together."

"Indeed." He bowed his head to her as he passed over her latte.

She accepted it graciously and took a long drink from it before clutching the take-out cup close to her chest. "Oh yeah…I've missed this. But…I'll get used to tea, right?"

Castle pursed his lips. "I'll send you a year's supply of Starbucks K-cups."

"Bless you."

He laughed then straightened his expression when a thought hit him. "Hey we've…we've never been out of the country together, have we?"

"Mm nope," she said before taking another sip of coffee. As she could count the number of times she had left the United States on one hand, she was certain none of those times had been with Castle. They had, however, been on several group vacations together including one to Las Vegas and another to Orlando.

As a general rule, Kate liked traveling with Castle and his posse—and not just because traveling with Castle generally meant many travel upgrades. As he spent many hours avoiding his writing and procrastinating by visiting dozens of sites on the Internet, Castle's vacations were always well-researched. He took them to interesting places and restaurants off the beaten path. She always appreciated his unique take on things and had yet to have a bad time on a trip with him. (Well, except that night with the strippers in Vegas, but she'd forgive him that one trespass; they had all had more than their fair share of alcohol that evening.)

"So, shall we?" he said, gesturing towards the bakery. She nodded and approached the door. Castle stepped ahead of her and opened the door for her. "So…explain why you and I are checking out the wedding cake instead of you and your husband-to-be?"

Kate let out a long sigh. "Because…William is helping pack up all the things we need for the wedding and taking them out to the country house. Then, he'll come back to London to pick up you, me, and my father so we can go out there together."

Castle's brow wrinkled. Kate's tone made it seems as though William's task was akin to scaling Everest when, really, it didn't seem that big of a deal. Castle did not know how far the country house was from London, but given the descriptions of it he'd heard, he doubted it was much more than an hour's drive; ninety minutes at most. William's task could have been construed as slightly inconvenient but certainly not that bad. "Okay…?"

Kate shut her eyes and shook her head quickly. Then, plastering a fake smile across her face, she turned to her friend. "Nothing, it's nothing. William and I just had a…disagreement about it this morning but it's fine." With that, she walked up to the man standing behind the bakery's counter.

Castle trailed a few steps behind her when she went. Interesting, very interesting. As with most women, he knew that Kate describing the situation as "fine" meant it was anything but. In fact, he hazarded to guess that "a…disagreement" meant fight. Castle fought a smile at this notion. Kate and William fighting was definitely good for him—very good.

"Castle." Kate's voice pulled Castle from daydreams of Kate and William having a knock-down-drag-out in his parent's fancy dining room.

"Hmm? What? Sorry."

"It's okay." She laughed lightly. "I just thought you'd want to try the cake."

He stepped forward eagerly and grasped the fork she handed him. As he had only eaten part of his room service breakfast, he was starving. So starving, in fact, that he didn't bother to notice the fact that the wedding Kate did not exactly look like traditional wedding case—traditional in the American sense. Castle dove right in, took a huge bite and immediately grimaced. "What am I eating?"

"Wedding cake."

"No."

"Yes."

"No." Castle swallowed hard before taking a gulp of coffee to cleanse his palate. "What's wrong with it?"

Having somewhat intentionally caught her friend off-guard, Kate could not help but let out a soft chuckle. "Traditionally, British wedding cakes are fruit cakes."

Castle could not have grimaced more harshly if she told him the cake was made from anchovies and rotten eggs. "Oh god why? I, ah, sorry," he added quickly at the scowl on the baker's face.

Kate stole the fork back from Castle and took a bite. Okay, so it was not a cake she would have chosen, but it really wasn't that bad. This cake was hardly the Americanized fruitcakes that more strongly resembled rocks than dessert. It tasted decent enough (though, to be fair, she did not taste much else other than the brandy). "It's good."

"Or you're lying," he challenged.

She shot him a glare so he would not continue to embarrass her in front of the already perturbed baker. Taking the hint, the writer ducked out of the bakery and out onto the sidewalk while shaking his head. Fruit cake for wedding cake? Ridiculous. Now he actually felt bad for Kate if she went through with this preposterous thing. Who wanted cheated out of a delicious vanilla cake with buttercream icing and perhaps a raspberry filling. Or—oh! Chocolate cake with raspberry filling. Yes, that was better and, damn, now he was hungry again.

Several minutes later Kate returned to the sidewalk and Castle asked, "Did you order your gross cake?"

"Castle," she said, her tone warning.

"What? It was gross. As your maid of honor I feel it's my duty to have an opinion."

Kate 'hmm-'ed into her coffee cup before suggesting they walk up the adjoining street. "Actually there's something I wanted to mention to you."

Intrigued, he glanced over at her. "Oh?"

Kate sucked in a deep breath and glanced over at her companion. This was not a conversation she looked forward to having, but given how unhappy her future husband sounded during their discussion about it the prior evening, she knew the subjected needed broached whether she liked it or not. "William said you said something to him last night…"

Castle stopped walking and thought for a moment. From Kate's tone he knew she was referring to something negative, but he had tried so hard to be polite and proper. He hadn't said anything that would—oh. Except for when he told William he didn't deserve Kate; that probably wasn't his smartest move.

Locking eyes with his friend he said, "He was being a punk; I called him out on it." With that, he kept walking.

Kate scurried after him. "A punk?" That adjective to describe her fiancé was downright preposterous. "I don't think anyone could ever describe William has a punk."

Castle huffed. Okay, Kate wanted it played straight, he'd play it straight. "Punk was my choice word for douchebag asshole."

Kate flinched as though a blast of cold air had been blown into her face. "Harsh."

Again, Castle stopped walking. "Well I'm sorry Kate, but if you're upset and your future husband brushes it off with little concern, then-"

"No, he wasn't." Kate jumped quickly to William's defense. "He asked how I was doing the second I went back inside—after you left. I…he's just stressed about the wedding and going to Cairo in less than a month."

Castle said nothing as they continued down the street. He wanted their argument to continue. He wanted to lay it all out for her. Tell her that William was no good and he would be far, far better for her, but he couldn't. He knew from how quickly she defended him Kate would not be receptive to such an opinion. Instead, he decided on a different approach.

"Speaking of…I was never able to ask you: what are you going to do in Cairo? I mean, do you have a job?" Truly, he'd been wondering it for a few days. When he first heard about her move to Cairo he'd been so stunned that the information barely processed in his mind. Cairo. The notion was so abstract his brain simply stopped computing, but in time it sunk in. She was going to Africa for possibly up to a year. A year during which he wouldn't see her at all. Just the thought of it broke his heart.

"No, not this quickly. All the universities would have already hired their staff. Besides, I haven't been teaching that long. Only had my doctorate for a year and a half. It'd be hard for me to get a job. I'm just going to work on publishing, actually."

"And you'll be there for a full year?"

Kate bobbed her head. "Officially, William is only signed on for the fall semester, but he's very confident the work will continue into the spring."

"But then you'll be back in New York? Or return to London?" He hoped for the former, for more than a year away from her was a fate too horrible to imagine.

"I don't know," she replied honestly. "Anthropologists move around a lot more than literature professors do. We'll just have to play it by ear and see what happens."

Castle stopped abruptly and blinked at his friend. "See what happens? You? Miss 'Even my plans have plans.'"

She laughed. "I'm not that bad, Castle."

"Surely you jest. You forget I witnessed you have a _complete and total meltdown_ when your subway stop was going to be closed for a month."

Her jaw dropped. Only Castle's elephant-like memory would retain such an incident. "Okay, first: I was twenty-two. Second, I had terrible PMS that day."

"Whatever you have to tell yourself…" he replied teasingly.

She rolled her eyes and gave his arm a playful slug. "C'mon let's go find something to eat."

Castle's eyes lit up. "Brunch!?"

Laughing at his enthusiasm she said, "Sure, why not."

* * *

Three hours later after picking up the elder Beckett from the airport and loading everyone's luggage into the car, their trek to the Fitzgerald country residence was complete. To say that the home was impressive would have been a grand understatement. In fact, Castle's exact reaction contained more than a few curses, which earned him a rear-view mirror glare from the Fitzgerald behind the wheel of their Land Rover.

Upon first sight of the expansive, all stone exterior home, the writer understood why Kate had originally described the home as a castle; it resembled a royal residence more than a little bit. He imagined that to be truly classified as a castle the home would have needed to be larger and contain a few turrets, perhaps a moat or even a drawbridge; it had none of those things. The Fitzgerald home was simply a very old, very large residence currently owned by William's uncle, who was generously allowing his nephew to use the space for his wedding while they were, unfortunately, in Greece for a summer holiday.

Inside the palatial home, Castle settled himself into one of the many guest rooms. He would be bunking with Javier when he arrived early the next morning; Kevin and Jenny would have the room across the hall. Originally, none of them planned on attending the wedding simply due to a factor of cost; they could not afford an international plane ticket on such short notice. When, however, it became obvious Castle's grand wedding-ruining plans would not come to fruition while Kate was still in the States, Castle purchased tickets for his three friends, knowing they'd want a front row seat for the wedding implosion. This was all done under the guise of not wanting Kate's very good friends to miss out on her special day—a perfect cover story, if Castle thought so himself.

After unpacking his suitcase and hanging up his nicer clothing, Castle headed off to explore the house and grounds. Per the wedding schedule he knew that Kate, her father, William and his parents were having their first meet-and-greet over afternoon tea. As he passed the dining room on the way out of the home, Castle heard the faint sounds of cups scraping against saucers and the low hum of chatter; he made a mental note to ask Jim what he thought of the Fitzgerald's at the first available opportunity.

Stuffing his hands in his pockets, Castle headed out onto the grounds, following the paved brick path out into the garden and the surrounding land. Despite it being August, there was a definite crispness to the air and he was glad for his long pants and long button-down with the sleeves rolled to the elbow; in anything else he probably would have been chilly.

Castle wandered around, observing the space for the better part of forty minutes before taking a seat on a garden bench and staring out across the rolling landscape. Begrudgingly, he had to admit that the Fitzgerald residence was a nice one. Unquestionably, he preferred his Manhattan loft and Hamptons beach house, but if he had to be stuck living in that home for the rest of his life he didn't think he would be terribly unhappy.

With this notion, his thoughts turned back to the bride to be. Kate spending a year in Cairo? He couldn't see it. Just walking the five hundred feet from his house to the surf had her griping on most days (though he couldn't understand it, she always claimed to dislike the texture of sand against her feet). Plus, he didn't know of anyone not made of wax who would melt quicker than Kate on a blistering hot summer day. She was a city girl through and through and, as far as he was aware, archaeologists didn't spend too much time in major cities; there wasn't a whole lot to dig up there. Thus, he could not see her happy spending her life with William—wherever they landed.

As though she had been summoned by his thoughts of her, not one minute later Castle heard a gentle, "Hey," floating towards his ears. Turning his head, he saw her approaching with a knitted brow. She sat beside him on the bench and said nothing so he prompted with, "How was tea?"

With one look from her he could tell the inaugural introductions had not gone off without any hitches. "Oh so it went well then?" he asked with notable sarcasm.

She let out a mirthless laugh. "About as well as it went when you met them."

Castle thought back to the night before and his first interactions with the elder Fitzgeralds. All in all, he did not think their meal had gone _that_ badly. True, his comment at the end about William not deserving Kate was ill-advised and probably should not have been said, however up until that point he had not openly offended them. Castle and the Fitzgeralds were from different worlds and it was obvious that in any other situation they would not have socialized but still he didn't think it had been completely disastrous. Applying those thoughts to Kate's father he said, "But your dad's a classy guy—classier than me." He guessed Jim Beckett was wise enough not to make the faux pas of an inadvertent fart joke during the soup course.

Kate shook her head gently. "But he's a solicitor."

"Huh?"

"British speak for lawyer," she clarified.

"Oh." After a second of thought his eyes lit up. "Wait! I remember this from _Downton_ _Abbey_! The Crawleys weren't impressed by Matthew because he was a solicitor…but that was 1910."

"Hello!" Kate proclaimed in an 'isn't it obvious' way while gesturing behind her to the Fitzgerald residence. "Castle meet castle. They act like it's the early nineteen hundreds."

Castle nodded at this point, but continued his argument to the contrary. "But… _technically_ your father is a professor now."

She shrugged. "I don't think they saw the difference."

"I'm sorry. Truly—it would have been really nice if they had gotten along." His words weren't full of sarcasm or snark; they were genuine. He knew Kate was already stressed enough and hated to see anything added to her already full plate. Though he did not know them very well and thus felt it was unfair to judge too harshly, Castle could not help but think the fault of the poor meeting lie with William's parents; they did not seem as open to their American in-laws as he imagined Kate's father was to them.

They sat in silence for several moments before Castle could not stop himself from saying, "So about Cairo…"

Kate eyed her friend suspiciously. "Why are you obsessing over this?"

"I'm not."

"You are."

He huffed out a breath. "Well, it's just Cairo, Kate. Cairo. That's in a different country!"

She blinked at him slowly. "London is in a different country."

He pursed his lips together tightly, thinking of a different defense. "It's in Africa!"

Kate rolled her eyes and skimmed her hands up and down her thighs; here came the melodramatic side of her writer friend. "Relax, Castle."

Knowing she thought he was overreacting, Castle grumbled. "I'm just…I'm concerned you're not going to be happy."

Her eyebrows arching upwards, Kate looked to her friend. Okay, that was not the direction she expected the conversation to go. Typically, his melodramatic moods were inwardly focused, so external concern was a refreshing change. "Well, that's…sweet Castle, but it's fine, really. It's going to be an interesting adventure."

He turned on the bench so that he faced her more directly. "I'm not saying you shouldn't have adventures, Kate, but the whole point of having the right adventure is doing it with the right person."

"Exactly." She nodded her head. "Which is why I'll be doing them with my husband. What's the matter with you? Why are you so worked up over this?" she asked at his clearly unsatisfied expression.

Ah, he thought; this is the moment. The perfect opportunity. Rubbing his clammy hands against his knees, he said, "Well, the truth is I…I…I—well, who am I going to have Sunday brunch with?" His voice trailed off on the end as he fell subject to self-loathing. Why couldn't he just say it? Why wouldn't the words come out? _Because I'm afraid she'll hate me_ , he answered for himself. Right. There was that.

Kate smiled for the first time that hour. "You'll survive."

"I might not."

"Okay, Castle; I'll make you a deal. I'm not saying this will happen every week, but at least once a month we will have a Skype brunch—just the two of us."

Castle thought Skype brunches with Kate might be the saddest thing he'd ever heard of. Yes, seeing her face over Skype was better than not seeing her at all, but when compared to their typical weekly get-togethers? They would be torture! "But it won't be the same."

"No," she sighed, "it won't be, but that'll make you feel better right?"

He shrugged and waivered his head back and forth. "It'd make me feel better if you said you were going to miss me too."

That time, a full grin broke out on her face. "You're impossible." He merely made his expression more innocent, which made her laugh. She leaned over and nudged his elbow with hers. "I'm going to miss you, Castle. Of course I'm going to miss you. Better?"

"A little."

"I'm glad." Then, after thirty seconds of silence she added, "I guess I've been hiding long enough—I'd better go check on William and our parents."

Castle's ears perked at the mention of the fiancé. "Dare I ask what his opinion was of the in-laws first meeting?"

Kate opened her mouth to respond, but then shut it again. She studied the face of her friend, unsure if she should tell a full truth or a half one. Ultimately, she decided on the former. "He…he said maybe it's best they live in separate countries."

Castle's jaw nearly hit his lap. "Are you-"

"Don't Castle." She warned, shutting her eyes and shaking her head. "Not if it's not going to be productive. I can only handle one group of disagreeing people at a time."

Castle "hmph-ed" but could not stay silent completely. "Fine, but that doesn't seem like a very nice thing to say. Maybe you should consider that very carefully."

Kate's gaze landed on Castle, but only for a fraction of a second. Without saying a word, she pushed herself off the bench and walked quickly back to the house, not once looking back at the very displeased writer.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13**

After their discussion in the garden, Castle steered clear of Kate for the remainder of the afternoon and all the way up until dinner. Quite honestly he was angry with her—angry that she was putting up with William's negative comments and not fighting back or at least attempting to voice her disagreement. If he hadn't seen it with his own eyes, he never would have believed the woman he knew for a decade would put up with something like that. The Kate he thought he knew should have spoken up for herself, yet she said nothing.

At dinner, Castle sat with Kate's father at the opposite end of the table from the future newlyweds. He and Jim had a nice conversation as they always did when they were together, but were unable to talk about the Fitzgeralds as they sat just a few feet away. Still, Castle considered it to be the best meal he had since jumping the pond.

With a mostly restful seven hours sleep behind him, Castle awoke Friday morning prepared for battle. Little more than twenty-four hours remained before the "I dos" and his mission had reached DEFCON 1 status. Quite honestly, as he reached the third week anniversary of learning of the engagement, Castle was growing quite exhausted with the whole situation, but as the clocked ticked closer and closer to zero, he knew he'd fight his way through—all the way to the very end.

Brightening the morning was the arrival of Javier, Kevin and Jenny, the only other American wedding attendees. Though she had awoken that morning with a scowl, Kate managed a smile when her slightly bedraggled friends arrived after their all night flight from New York. They exchanged hugs and cheek kisses before Kate stepped back, gazed down at their luggage and then back up at her guests expectantly. "Where's my dress?"

The men exchanged glances. "What dress?"

"My wedding dress," she clarified, her tone clearly irritated.

Javier looked at Kevin, who shrugged. Looking back to Kate he said, "We don't have your wedding dress."

Her brow knitted tightly together. "What do you mean…Castle?"

Hearing his name the writer looked up from his phone. "What?"

Kate planted her fists at her hips, her heart rate beginning to increase. "Why don't they have my wedding dress?"

Completely baffled, the writer replied. "Why would they?"

"You said it wasn't ready yet! You said it was coming Friday!" Kate's tone had reached near shrieking levels and all three men took a step back. Meanwhile, in female solidarity, Jenny's arms crossed tightly over her chest as she stared down the men.

"Yes…," Castle said slowly, "but I never said with them." He very, very clearly remembered his trip to _Dream Brides_ the morning before his flight to London. When he inquired at the receptionist for the gown, he thought nothing of the woman's pale expression and excuse that she needed to find the store manager for him to speak with. His brain was focused on packing, the trip ahead, and coming to grips with the fact that he was picking up his best friend's wedding dress, meaning there was a possibility she could marry William after all. Plus, as it was the first he was involved with, he was too naïve about weddings to be suspicious.

When the apologetic store manager appeared and informed him that, despite their promise, the dress was not ready, his rage kicked in and he became the bridezilla Kate had not been (well, bridezilla by proxy). Despite his anger and the store manager's apologies, there was nothing that could be done. The seamstress had a family emergency and had been unable to complete the work. They promised, however, the dress would be ready by the end of the following day. After making a snippy remark about broken promises, Castle phoned Kate's father for a proper address, not wanting to worry the bride herself.

"It's coming Fed Ex," he continued. Keeping with the worry-free plan, Castle had negotiated that, as it was their broken promise putting the wedding in this tight position, the bridal shop would ship the dress to the Fitzgerald residence on their own dime as soon as the dress was ready with Friday as the guaranteed delivery date. So as not to worry her, Castle merely told Kate that the dress would arrive Friday, but had not clarified the "how" portion. He assumed this was how she guessed the boys would be bringing it with them.

Kate chewed at her bottom lip. "So it's coming today then?"

"Does Fed Ex deliver to castles?" Kevin asked.

After shooting him an annoyed look, Castle pulled up his email inbox on his phone. "Hold on, just let me check the tracking number."

"Sorry guys," Kate laughed, sliding her hands down into her back jean pockets, "Just a little edgy, I guess."

Jenny smiled and patted her arm. "No problem; it's perfectly understandable."

"Uh oh."

The sound that escaped the writer's lips pulled the attention of everyone else in the room. Kate's blood pressure spiked again as she practically jumped in his direction. "Uh oh? Uh oh?! What does uh oh mean?!"

This wasn't happening. This could not be happening. Castle continued to stare down at the Fed Ex tracking page with pure horror. Surely it was a joke; surely he was reading it wrong because this absolutely, positively, could not be reality. "Hold on a second let me call the-"

"No! Not until you explain what 'uh oh' means." Kate demanded of her maid of honor.

Castle let out a long sigh and let his arm fall limp at his sides. Meeting her furious gaze, he confessed, "I…according to this, your dress was re-routed back to New York, but I'm sure that's just some kind of system error."

Kate clapped both of her hands against her cheeks. "Oh god, oh god." Her wedding dress! Only _the_ most important part of her wedding. How in the hell was she supposed to get married in twenty-four hours without a wedding dress?!

Jumping in, Jenny stepped up behind Kate and guided her to a nearby chair. "Here, just sit down Kate; let Rick figure it out."

For quite possibly the most agonizing seven minutes of her life Kate sat in a wildly uncomfortable antique chair as Jenny crouched beside her, rubbing her back and telling her everything would be fine. Javier and Kevin stood awkwardly beside their luggage knowing there was nothing they could do to help the situation. Finally, Castle, who had stepped outside to make the phone call, returned with an expression not unlike those seen during funerals.

His heart sinking down past his knees, he began, "Um Kate."

She stood up so quickly that she nearly knocked Jenny over in her haste. "Where's the dress?"

With a tone of utmost remorse the writer said, "It's in New York."

Kate fought the urge to vomit. "W-what?"

Castle's shattered heart fractured into more pieces as he took a step towards her, her haunted tone clawing at his soul. Yes, he wanted to stop the wedding, but hurting Kate in the process was never part of the deal. "Kate I am so sorry. I swear I wrote down the address right—I swear I did but…But Fed Ex said there was no such deliverable address so it was returned to sender."

Oh yeah, okay, she was definitely going to throw up. Her hands covering her mouth, she mumbled out, "Wha," unable to complete the full syllable.

Castle clasped his fingers together and held them out, begging her for forgiveness. "Kate, oh my god Kate; I am so sorry."

Kate took three in-and-out breaths through her nose as she tried to formulate a response. Gulping down the bile rising in her throat, she stepped towards him. "Castle! I'm getting married tomorrow and that was my wedding dress. You're my maid of honor!"

Castle shut his eyes and dropped his chin to his chest. It had been so long since Kate was honestly, truly mad at him, he'd forgotten just how painful it was to be at the receiving end of her rage; the absolute last thing he wanted was to hurt her in any way. "I know, I know and I'm so sor-"

"Well you know what?" she snapped at him. "Sorry isn't good enough."

Castle's regret faded at the sharpness of her tone. Okay, maybe he had given Fed Ex the wrong address. If that was the case, he certainly hadn't done so maliciously. She had the right to be upset, but not flat out deny his request for forgiveness. A brief burst of annoyance bursting through his curtain of remorse he snipped, "Then maybe you should take this as a sign."

Not expecting this response, Kate blinked. "A sign of what?"

"A sign that you're not supposed to get married tomorrow."

No one in the entryway moved, spoke or breathed for thirty seconds as Kate and Castle stared each other down, both challenging the other to be the next to make a move. Finally, to ease the tension, Jenny stepped forward. "Hey Kate you know what? It's fine. Totally fine. We're an hour away from London, right? One of the biggest cities in the world. We can go find a wedding dress there, okay?"

Kate glanced over at her friend as though she'd just awaken from a trance. "Yeah…I…okay…"

* * *

"Holy shit bro," Javier began once the two ladies had left on their journey to the city. "This certainly was an interesting plot twist."

Pinching the bridge of his nose, Castle began to pace back and forth. "I didn't plan this! I didn't! I wrote that address down—god, what does it even matter? The dress isn't here…Jesus I ruined everything."

"Um…wasn't that the point of this?" Kevin chimed in with confusion.

"No! The point was the make her realize William is wrong for her—not lose her damn wedding dress! Now she hates me."

"Well I'm thinking that comment about the missing dress being a sign she shouldn't get married tomorrow didn't exactly help your case," Kevin said pointedly. Then, at the writer's expression he added, "Yeah I know I'm not helping. Okay how about this: she just needed to be mad at someone, right? She'll come around. I'm sure Jenny will help her find a nice dress."

Javier stepped forward and tapped Castle on the right shoulder. "Let's get to the real issue here, bro. She'll be married in twenty-four hours. What the hell are you going to do about it?"

Castle opened his arms, palms up, and shrugged. "I have no idea." Truly, he didn't. As the wedding drew nearer, his internal debate grew more and more aggressive. Yes, he felt William was the wrong man for her. Yes, he wanted her for himself, but he also wanted her to be happy. Kate's happiness was paramount and just because he believed she would be happier with him than William didn't mean that was actually what would happen (his opinion was, after all, slightly bias).

In the three weeks since their engagement he'd given Kate multiple opportunities to see the differences between William and herself, but they seemed just as together as ever. Even the less-than-perfect meeting between her father and his parents had not swayed her. Maybe nothing would.

Javier clicked his tongue angrily. "I have one: tell her how you feel."

Castle blinked as though his friend had just suggested he attend the wedding in a SCUBA suit rather than his morning coat. "What…like, just tell her?"

"Uh, yeah!"

Castle shrugged and slipped his hands down into his pockets. "I…I dunno."

"Oh!" Kevin jumped in. "Write her a note – writing's more your wheelhouse anyway, right?"

The author's chin lifted a bit higher on this suggestion. "Yeah…I could…"

"Well pick something and do it. Time's running out, bro. Unless you're going to pull one of those, "Speak now or forever hold your peace," interruptions."

Castle shook his head at Javier. "That's a terrible idea and it only works in movies." Then, after considering all the ideas that had been thrown at him he stood up a bit straighter, resigned to the idea they'd have to hash it out face-to-face. "You guys are right–I need to talk to her as soon as possible."

* * *

Castle had every intention of speaking with Kate the moment she returned from dress shopping in London, but that was easier said than done. He waited outside in the garden until he spotted their car returning almost five hours after they'd left. Though he hurried to meet them at the front of the house, Kate practically sprinted inside with her large garment bag, not once looking at him.

Still determined, he gave her half an hour to settle back in before trying again only to be intercepted by William, his least favorite person at the moment. William suggested that Castle had upset Kate enough for once day and perhaps it would be best if he left her alone until that evening when they would be having their brief wedding rehearsal followed by a dinner.

As Kate's wedding schedule had come with an American versus British weddings informational section, Castle was already aware that British weddings did not have a traditional rehearsal followed by a rehearsal dinner like they did in America. For those in the UK, the rehearsal was not followed by any sort of formal meal. However, since the wedding party and the American guests were staying at the Fitzgerald home and they all needed to eat, they were, in a way, having a rehearsal dinner anyway.

Down but not out, Castle asked Kevin to ask Jenny to ask Kate to speak with him as soon as she could, preferably before the rehearsal. Of course Castle put very little stock in William's opinion and in any other circumstance would have found no issue in shoving the man aside (physically, if necessary) and marching up to Kate himself, but he felt he'd already done enough damage for one day. As he was trying to win her over, he thought it best not to stir the pot any more than he had to.

As he readied himself for that night's dinner, Castle decided he needed to practice what he would say to Kate. He knew at that point, after making more than a few anti-William comments and inadvertently losing her wedding dress he would only have one shot—one chance to convince her that they were the ones who belong together; she didn't belong with William.

With his writing, Castle could tap out some notes on his keyboard, let them ruminate for a day or two as he went about his day-to-day tasks (or surfed the internet for hours on end). He would then write them out in a proper structure with paragraphs of direction and spoken dialog. He'd stare at those too, change, rewrite, go back, read them again, and rewrite them as many times necessary until he got them just the way he wanted. Real life wasn't like that. Once you spoke words they were out there never to be rescinded.

Staring into the mirror above the dresser in his bedroom, Castle began to speak his thoughts aloud. "You can't marry him, Kate. You just can't. He's not right for you—you have to see that. I don't know if you love him, I don't think you do. I think you think you love him or you've convinced yourself you do because you want to marry him for…for some reason but I have no idea what that could be and…no, no, no; that's not right."

He shook his head, took a deep breath and started again. "I know you think you'll be happy, but Kate you wouldn't be… Your life is in New York—everything you know. Your job. Your friends. Your family. Me. And Kate, I…I can't face it without you. Besides my mother, you're the most important person in my life. No, no—forget mother." He shook his head and spoke with even more determination.

"You are the most important person in my life, Kate. I don't know how I'd get through a week—a day—without texting you. I dedicated my next book to you. I wasn't going to tell you—I was going to let you see it when you bought it as a surprise, but I did. I couldn't have written it without you. Your support. Your friendship. Because Kate I—Kate!" Castle jumped when he spotted the brunette's reflection in the mirror. He whipped around to face her, but her expression remained just as stern as it had been when she walked in the room a few moments earlier.

Folding her arms over her chest, Kate commented, "Interesting speech."

Castle felt his cheeks begin to heat and a few droplets of sweat form on his brow. "How much did you hear?"

"Enough." Then, after a beat she snipped, "What? Are you looking for applause or something?"

Castle swallowed hard and took a step towards her. "Kate, please let me-"

She stopped him with her right hand raised, palm facing him. "No, you know what Castle? Just don't." She took a step into the room and spoke in very slow, controlled words. "The past few weeks I thought you'd lost your mind. Ever since I came back from London and everything that's happened since…I don't know if I—no, you know what?" She shook her head. "It doesn't matter; I can't. After today I'm done. I'm just…done."

Her defeated tone made him nauseous. "Kate about the dress-"

She shook her head, cutting him off once more. "I know when you're lying Castle and I know it's not about this. It was a genuine mistake and I can't hate you for that. I'm upset, but I'll live. The dress we found today is…fine." She admitted with a shrug. Yes, she wanted to be furious at him, but she'd seen the nauseated look on his face when he delivered the news; he was just as upset as she was.

"But-"

"Look, it's become clear that you don't like William and that's ok. You don't have to like him. You just have to tolerate him: tonight and tomorrow and that's it." She was a fool to think that William could fold into her group of close friends easily. Yes, it would have been nice, but it was clear now that they were just too different and that was okay; not everyone always had to be best friends with everyone else. Politeness, however, was a requirement.

Castle could hardly believe what he was hearing—this was not how he wanted this to go! It sounded like Kate was saying goodbye and that was _definitely_ not something he wanted to face. "But Kate that's not-"

"Save it Castle. I just can't do this anymore." With that, she spun on her heel and took a step towards the door. With her hand on the frame, she paused, and turned to look back over her shoulder at him. "You know what would have been interesting? What might have happened if you ever had the guts to say those things to my face." And, with that, she walked out the door.


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter 14**

Richard Castle was ill. Terrible, terrifically sick. In fact, as he stood in cavernous makeshift chapel at the Fitzgerald estate watching Kate and William practice their matrimonial vows, he was certain he had never felt worse in his life. Not even the two antacids Kevin slipped him were aiding his churning gut.

To say things had not gone as he intended was a grand understatement. Blown up in his face seemed more accurate assuming that explosion was akin to that of a nuclear bomb. He could have hardly imagined a worse outcome, as it happened.

Three weeks earlier not one doubt existed in his mind that he would be able to terminate the engagement between Kate and the British professor. At that time, he thought it to be so unchallenging it would be amusing, which was why he included Javier and Kevin in on his scheming. He'd break them up and they'd have a good story to go along with it.

As time went on and each of his plans began to crack, crumble and fail, his worry grew, but he still knew he had a high likelihood of success. His belief hadn't faltered until that morning, when her wedding dress didn't show up and, now, after his failed attempt at a practice speech, horror coursed through his veins at the notion that Kate might actually be married to William in less than twenty-four hours. Worse yet, he'd have a front row seat.

Robotically, he went through the motions of the wedding rehearsal, letting the clergymen tell him when to walk down the aisle and where to stand. All the while, Kate avoided his gaze, which he figured was for the best. Had she looked at him, he may not have been able to control his reaction. If she looked sad, he probably would have dropped to his knees then and there, begged for her forgiveness and a second chance. If she looked angry, he would have been too devastated to continue on and probably would have walked right out of the room, never to look back.

As the rehearsal came to an end, Castle inadvertently bore witness to a rare public kiss between Kate and William. Immediately, he felt as though a hot iron was slicing through his chest down into his gut. Watching them be intimate was pure torture for him. He hated it and never wanted to see it again. In fact—

That's when it hit him. The full weight of what Kate had said during their argument in his room an hour earlier. He didn't like William and only had to put up with him for that day and the next. The finality of her statement implied that she and William never had intentions of returning to New York—at least, not in a permanent capacity. They would jet off to Cairo then move back to London or possibly to another foreign destination. If they came back to Manhattan, presumably it would just before a visit and, clearly by her statement, it would not be to spend significant time with him.

The stakes were now immeasurably high and success and failure fell into two very clear categories. If he succeeded and stopped the wedding, things would remain as they were, but if he failed it was not just an opportunity to be in a relationship to be with Kate he would lose. No, it appeared he would lose his best friend all together.

With such a nauseating notion bouncing around in his brain, Castle shuffled his way back to the dining room along with the rest of the wedding party. Javier and Kevin gave him curious glances, but he shook his head. He hadn't told anyone about his fight with Kate and, in that moment, he didn't have the heart to. Honestly, he wasn't even sure he wanted to sit down at the dinner table. His appetite was so nonexistent he feared he would be unable to eat enough food to be polite without needing to excuse himself from the meal due to illness.

Just outside the dining room, Castle felt a hand slip around his elbow. Looking to his left, he saw Kate's father his usual jovial expression replaced by a knitted brow and tight lips. "You don't look like you're having very much fun, Rick."

Castle let out a mirthless laugh. "What gave it away?"

Jim nodded his head slowly. "You know Katie's not really mad at you about the dress?" He'd spoken with his daughter after her return from London and she seemed genuinely happy with her latest gown. Granted, that could have been relief that she was able to find a dress that actually fit her. Plus, she seemed very excited that it had been on a clearance rack and cost her less than five hundred pounds.

"No, I know. We…talk about it. Kind of. It's just…" He sighed and gazed into the dining area where Kate and William chatted with the clergymen. Williams's parents stood several feet behind them, whispering at each other, displeased expressions on their face. "These people don't seem all that welcoming of her. I don't think she'll be happy…do you? I mean do you think she's happy with William?"

Jim rocked back on his heels as he observed at his only child. Knowing she had never been one to jump head first into anything, he'd been suspicious of her speedy engagement right from the get go, but after his less-than-stellar tea with the Fitzgerald family the prior afternoon, his trepidation had grown even further. "I think she wants to be happy and she believes William will make her happy."

"But what if there's someone who can make her happier?" Castle challenged. He met the elder man's gaze with no intention of hiding the fact that he believed himself to be that man.

Jim wasn't surprised at all. In fact, he'd been waiting for it to happen for years. He'd say one thing, though: for being a generally sharp, brilliant man the writer did have awful timing. "I'd say that person is very quickly running out of time." With that, he patted Castle's arm and walked into the dining room.

* * *

The tension across Castle's back, shoulders and neck did not lessen during the duration of dinner. If anything, his muscles were even more knotted by the time William thanked everyone for all they had done to aid in the speedy wedding at the close of their meal. This was it; his final chance.

As he was out of both time and options, Castle knew he had to go for broke and lay everything out for Kate. He had to tell her how he felt—how he really felt. As he had heavily guarded his heart for years, such a concept was petrifying, but he knew his heartfelt emotions were an advantage in this particular instance. Surely, if he bared his soul to her she wouldn't turn him down. She would see just how strongly he felt and give them a chance. That was assuming he could get the words out without making a mess of things—again.

The dinner guests began pushing themselves up from the table and drifting towards the hallway, chatting amongst themselves. Castle remained still, though, watching Kate and William have a private moment, his fists clenched into sweaty balls. Soon, they too pushed back from the table and began their journey towards the stairs. _Now or never_ , Castle thought to himself, pushing his chair back with such force he nearly tipped it.

"Ah, Kate? Could-could I speak to you for just a moment?" Castle said tentatively as she passed him.

Her gaze fell into one of exhaustion before she looked over a William. He looked as stoic as Castle had ever seen him. Clearly, their negative feelings toward one another were mutual, though Castle hazarded to guess William's dislike grew significantly upon hearing the news of the lost wedding dress.

"It's okay," Kate promised him. "I'll be up in a few minutes."

William looked at Castle then back to Kate. "You're sure?"

She bobbed her head and gave his forearm a gentle squeeze. Only once he had reluctantly walked away did she look at the writer expectantly, her arms folded over her chest.

Castle was about to open his mouth to speak when the housekeeper entered the dining room and began clearing off the dinner plates. Knowing he needed a more private venue for his confession, he put his hand gently behind Kate's left shoulder and guided her into the adjoining sitting room, where they were alone. "I'm sorry about everything that's happened today: the dress, the way you walked in on me practicing what I was going to say—what I've been trying to say for weeks but I… I just could never find the words and, believe me, that irony isn't lost on me," he said with the bitter shake of his head.

Gazing down at her, he saw her stern expression begin to melt into one of slight curiosity, so he continued. "I know this is terrible timing—the worst timing. I should have said something three weeks ago…or that night after your bachelorette party when we were alone on the deck, but I…I could never get the words together. That's why I like writing because I can write something and delete it or rewrite it and-"

"Castle!" Kate cut off her friend's rambling. Her tone was not mean or particularly irritated, merely exhausted and wishing he would get to the point.

Thrown off by her sudden interruption, Castle threw his arms down at his sides. He stared at her for the better part of thirty seconds, waiting for words to come, but they never did. Instead, he did the only thing he could think of: he grabbed her biceps, pulled her forward and smashed his lips into hers.

Okay, so that probably was not the best thing he could have done in that moment. As far as first kisses went, it was rather poor. Kate's body was as rigid as the marble busts adoring the room in which they stood and, in his haste, Castle's lips had barely met their mark, but it was enough to get his point across.

When he pulled back, Kate's jaw dropped and her eyes clouded with a mix of shock, confusion, and, disappointingly, a little bit of horror. "What the hell are you-"

"I love you."

As Castle's chest heaved up and down from the rapid beating of his heart, Kate's mouth closed slowly and she stared at him wide-eyed. "I'm in love with you," he continued. "You're the last person I think about before I go to sleep and the first person I think about when I wake up. But I don't want to just be thinking about you—I want you to be there with me when I go to sleep and when I wake up. I want to make you breakfast in bed and bring coffee to your office after you've been grading papers for hours and hours."

Castle paused as he began to pace a two foot square area in front of where she stood, completely dumbfounded. "If I thought for one minute you would be happy with William, I wouldn't be saying any of this, but my god Kate you have to wake up and see that you're making a terrible mistake. Marrying someone you met two months ago? That's not you. And moving to Cairo!? Are you kidding me? You hate to be hot! And you hate the sand on the beach!"

As he had all but shouted his final words, he softened his tone. "Look, I'm not going to stand here and tell you that we'll be perfect for each other and we'll never fight and we'll get married and we'll be together forever. Maybe we will; maybe we won't, but my god, don't we owe it to ourselves to try?"

Kate stared at the writer, his hands clasped in front of him in a begging gesture. She half expected him to drop onto his knees and grovel from his expression, but he didn't. His gaze burning with the love he'd just professed made her stomach flip in her gut. She shook he head and took a half step away from him, completely overwhelmed by what she felt in that moment. "I...I don't have time for this."

Taking a step towards her, he challenged, "You don't have time to make a decision that's going to affect the rest of your life?"

Kate skimmed her hands across her brow and shook her head. Now? He was doing this now? He'd literally had hundreds if not thousands of opportunities to do so in the time they'd known each other, but he was choosing now, literally eighteen hours before she was to say "I do" to another man.

The fire of fury alighting within her she spoke sharply. "You know, you don't have a right to say any of this to me. Ten years, Rick. We've known each other for ten years, which means you had ten years of opportunities to say any of this stuff and I can't help but think you wouldn't be saying this if you didn't hate William so much."

Her words struck him like lightening. God, was that what she thought of him? That he would lie about his feelings? "If I..."

"You've been trying to break us up, haven't you?" She hadn't seen it at the time, probably because she hadn't wanted to. She was already so overwhelmed, she could barely make it through the day and remember to east on top of all the wedding prep tasks, but with his love confession, she thought back and it all became clear. He was subtle about it, she'd give him that, but the baseball game, the tiny comments he made. He was setting them up for fights and she hadn't even realized.

"It's not about that anymore. I mean it is but it's not. I don't want you to just not be with him; I want you to be with me."

A blip of laughter escaped her lips. "For what, Castle? Three months until you're ready to move on to someone else?"

Castle felt his stomach lurch. "Wha…No. God, no! I would never Kate. I love you." He reached out and grabbed her right hand and was almost surprised when she didn't pull it back. "I've loved you for ten years, but I was too scared to realize it and yeah, that's on me—I should have said something sooner, but I'm saying something now. And this isn't just a result of you being with William. I was going to say something the day you got back from your semester at Oxford. Yeah, I was," he added when he saw her eyebrows rise curiously. "Ask Javi and Kevin - they'll tell you. But then you walked in with Mr. Sophisticated and called him your fiancé..."

Castle shook his head. He was getting off track. This wasn't about William; this was about Kate. "Look that's not the point. The point is that you're my best friend and I don't want you to make any huge mistakes and marrying him would be the biggest mistake you could make."

Kate wrenched her hand out of Castle's grasp. She pursed her lips tightly together and her nostrils flared when she exhaled sharply. "Well you know what, Rick? It's my life and I get to make my own choices."

Ah, there it was; the suborn Kate Beckett he knew all too well. This was the reaction he'd feared all along. The reason he did not come right out and tell her not to marry William the moment he found out about their engagement. Tell Kate Beckett not to do something and she'll want to do it all the more just to spite you.

From the look on her face, he knew he'd lost. It killed him and he knew in coming days would cause a crater-shaped hole in his heart, but he had to let her go. Taking a step back, he lowered his chin. "Yeah...yeah I guess you do."

She turned to go, but he couldn't help himself from saying one more thing. Calling out her name, she froze, but did not turn to face him. "I really just want you to be happy," Castle said. Then, he watched her disappear up the stairs, not once looking back.


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter Fifteen**

When Jim Beckett spotted the writer ascending the stairs looking as though he'd just received a terminal diagnosis from his doctor his heart broke for the younger man. If Rick looked as though his heart had just been plowed over by an eighteen-wheeler, Jim imagined that was because it had. Whatever discussion Rick had with his daughter had not gone well and that was unfortunate.

For the prior few weeks, Jim had found it difficult to pinpoint his exact feelings towards his daughter's fiancé. Any opinions he drew were overlaid by the pure shock he felt at the fact that his daughter was introducing a man whom he'd never met as her betrothed. When it came right down to it, Jim did not feel like he knew William well enough to judge him.

As a recovering alcoholic, Jim had found many times when people judged him based on little knowledge they had. During his life he had never been one for snap judgements—the lawyer in him wanted all the facts—but particularly after his recovery he wanted to give everyone the benefit of the doubt and not judge them until he felt he knew enough about them to do so fairly. Despite this, he was still a father and had certain gut instincts when it came to his child. Without her mother to consult with, Jim had honed those feelings on his own and, if he was forced to choose, his gut told him that Richard Castle was a better match for his Katie than any other man could be.

Jim and the writer had an interesting history but he undoubtedly considered the man one of the family and had for many years. True, Castle had a playboy side to him, but he was a wealthy thirty year old with a moderate amount of fame and Jim did not feel he was acting any differently than any other thirty year old man should he find himself with sudden wealth and a moderate amount of fame. More importantly, Jim had never known one instance in which Castle had not treated his daughter with the utmost respect and kindness.

Castle cared for Kate; that much was clear. For many years Jim suspected that Castle cared for her more than he let on—perhaps even more than he realized himself, but he knew it wasn't his place to speak up. Jim merely hoped the two of them would figure it out on their own. As whatever attempt they made had failed miserably, Jim knew he needed to get involved and nudge if necessary. After all, his daughter's happiness was at stake.

After waiting an hour for the dust to settle, Jim sought out his daughter in the room she shared with her fiancé in the large home. As per tradition, William was not to see his bride the night before the wedding, so Jim knew she would be alone. He knocked softly on the door and, when he received no response, he opened it a crack and said gently, "Katie?"

"Y-yeah Dad?"

From her response, he could tell she was crying and his heart clenched; ever since she was an infant Jim could never stand the sight of his daughter's tears; they tore up inside. He stepped into the room and found her sitting in the middle of the bed, her legs folded underneath her, a few used tissues resting by her knees. Jim walked over to the end of the bed and sat down on the edge. He didn't even have to ask her what was wrong; he'd barely been sitting for fifteen seconds before she confessed.

"Rick told me that he loved me."

Jim took in a deep breath; yep, that sounded about right. "I see."

Kate nodded her head and mopped a few fresh tears from her cheeks. "And it's just so stupid. I mean it's Castle—he is an idiot. He's so frustrating and irritating and god I just want to strangle him sometimes but…" Her voice drifted off as she shook her head.

"You love him, too," Jim finished for her.

"No! No, I don't." She spoke quickly and threw her used tissue down in disgust. At her father's persistent stare, her tone softened ever so slightly. "I don't. I could never love him because he's…"

"He's what? Give me one good, solid reason why you couldn't."

Why couldn't she love Castle? Only millions of reasons! He…he…well, he'd just messed with her head so much she couldn't think straight—but there were definitely reasons! Of course there were reasons. Oh! "He's commitment phobic."

Jim chuckled. "He's sure stuck by your side for long enough, hasn't he?" Kate clicked her tongue with annoyance and looked away from her father, just like she always did as a child. She was not permitted to walk away when they were in the middle of a discussion, but she always managed to turn her gaze away so she didn't face a scolding head-on.

"Listen, Katie, I'm going to tell you something I promised I never would have and I'm sorry it has to be on the night before your wedding, but you have to know the truth."

With a wrinkled brow, Kate turned back to her father. Well, that was an unexpected comment from him. She knew there were many things her father didn't tell her about—particularly things that happened in the wake of her mother's death, and during his battle with alcoholism. However, given their topic of discussion, it made sense that whatever he was about to confess involved Castle, and many of those dark things happened before she and Castle had ever met; thus, she could not conceive of what her father was about to tell her.

Jim took a deep breath and adjusted his position on the bed. "You know how bad things got for me, after your mother. I knew I was spiraling, but I didn't know how to help myself. That's what they tell you in those meetings—you have to ask for help, but I didn't want to ask you. You were starting your first year of grad school and I felt like I'd already burdened you so much."

Kate's gut clenched. Castle knew about her father's problems; he'd literally walked in on them, but she had no idea he'd…oh god. "Castle?"

Jim bobbed his head, the memories of the day hazy but still engrained into his mind. "He took me in, let me dry out on his couch, and then he took me to rehab and, Katie, he paid for the whole thing."

"What?" As the word escaped her lips, Kate's mind began to spin back to a time nearly eight years prior. She remembered the phone call she received from him. He was already at the rehab facility when he called her, crying. He told her he was going to get better—he promised he would be better that time. At that point, Kate found it difficult to believe as he had promised many times before, though since that was the first time he had entered a rehab facility she was slightly more optimistic, but still refused to get her hopes up too high as she had been previously burned.

To be honest, Kate never thought in great detail about how or why her father ended up in rehab that particular moment. She supposed that one of his colleges had taken him or he'd hired a car. Never in a million years would she have guessed Castle was the one responsible. And, to know that he had paid for the rehab as well…Simply put: she was stunned.

Clearing his throat, Jim continued. "He made me promise not to tell you. He didn't want to make a big deal out of it. He made me promise that if he did all that for me that I would stay clean and sober and I'd never hurt you again."

"Oh my god, Dad!" Fresh tears spilled out onto her cheeks. Castle wanted her father to promise not to hurt her again?! In her already emotionally fragile state, she could hardly process this information. Instead, she merely spluttered out, "You should have told me."

"Probably, but the truth is I didn't trust myself not to fall off the wagon. Some days, I still don't, but I know I don't want to let you down. Or let Rick down."

Kate could stay seated no longer. She collected her pile of used tissues, slid off the bed and deposited them in the trash can nearest the door. After grabbing a fresh one, she continued to mop beneath her nose as she paced the space between the door and the bed. "So why are you telling me this now? Just a few hours before I'm supposed to marry William?"

"Because you had to have all the facts." Jim stood from the bed, walked over and placed his hands gently on his daughter's shoulders. "Katie, listen: it doesn't matter to me what decision you make. If you love William and want to marry him and follow him to Cairo and wherever else he takes you, you should do that. If you love Rick and you want to spend your life in New York with him, then you should do that. I'll support you no matter what. I just want you to be happy. And that's what your mother would want, too."

Kate felt her heart clench at the mention of the woman who would never have the pleasure of watching her daughter walk down an aisle, no matter which man it was towards. Doing all of this without her mother was much more difficult than Kate anticipated. The only way she could get through it was by telling herself that no matter how sad she felt, it would not change the situation and she needed to stay in the moment and be happy when she could. That didn't mean she missed her mother any less, but she knew that's what her mother would have wanted. "What do you think she'd say about all this?"

Jim blinked slowly at her. "I think you already know."

Kate nodded and sniffed. "Probably, but you should tell me anyway."

"Go with your gut, Katie; your gut is never wrong."

Kate's stomach flipped when she heard the words. She knew—she knew what her gut was telling her but—oh god. How could she…? Everything that had happened—she thought it had been a sign. Meeting William when she did, having him be the exact man she thought she wanted. She'd tried to force her heart to change; to comply with the man her brain decided she needed, but she knew; she absolutely knew.

The heart wants what the heart wants and there's not a damn thing her brain could do about it.

Her hands beginning to tremble, Kate shuffled over to sit on the bed and then gazed up at her father with her red-rimmed eyes. "Dad, I…I think I've made a horrible mistake. I…I made Castle think that I…but I do and…he probably hates me."

Smiling inwardly, her father assured her, "I'm certain he doesn't."

Kate shook her head and covered her face with her hands. She was sitting in a bedroom in the Fitzgerald family castle. But if she went with her heart…god, could she…? That would mean that…Oh! The mere thought of it made her sick. "But I…We came all the way to England and William's family…"

Jim crouched down in front of his daughter so they were more eye-level. "Don't make a decision based on who you don't want to upset, Katie; you'd be doing a disservice to yourself."

She nodded, knowing he was right. Breaking things off with William would be terrifically upsetting and one of the hardest things she would ever do. He was a good man and she didn't want to hurt him, but knowing she broke Castle's heart hurt even more. Hurting William she could live with; hurting her best friend she could not. She didn't know what would happen with Castle—if he would be the man she married or if, in the end, it wouldn't work out—but she knew that if she didn't try, if she never gave them a chance, she would wonder "What if?" every single day for the rest of her life.

After taking another moment to mop the moisture from her cheeks and beneath her nose, she gave her father a kiss on the cheek and hurried down the hall to Castle's room. She knocked on the door and waited, her heart fluttering uncontrollably in her chest. She waited thirty seconds. Then a minute. Then almost two before she knocked again and kept knocking until, unexpectedly, Javier opened the door.

Kate took a half step back. "Wh-where's Castle?"

"He's gone."

"G-gone!?" Kate gasped, her heart plummeting towards his feet.

Javier bobbed his head. "He said you didn't want him and he couldn't watch you marry another man so Kevin volunteered to take him to the airport."

"Oh god no!" Kate proclaimed. She stood frozen for a moment, frantically looking around the room as though Javier was playing a joke on her and Castle was really hiding behind the curtains, but the room was otherwise vacant. Quickly, she sprinted back to her room and found her cell phone on the nightstand. Her fingers trembling, she pressed the button that would call Castle's cell phone; Kate growled when it went directly to voicemail. How had he managed to get on a plane already!?

"Kate?"

She looked up to find a curious Javier standing in the doorway of her bedroom. Chewing on her bottom lip, she considered her next course of action. She thought for several moments before she stepped up to her friend and said, "Don't tell Castle, okay? I need to talk to him in person so I guess that's going to have to be back in New York, but don't tell him what's going on, okay?"

"Okay…" Javier agreed slowly. "But seriously—what's going on? Are you getting married tomorrow?"

A grin broke out on Kate's face and she shook her head. "No, no I'm not."


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter Sixteen**

At four p.m. on Saturday afternoon, Richard Castle shuffled into his kitchen, opened the refrigerator and, upon finding it void of anything interesting, let out a heavy sigh. It had been an unbearably exhausting twenty-four hours and he wanted nothing more than to sleep, but he couldn't. Every time he tried to lie down and shut his eyes, his thoughts drifted towards Kate.

Kate—his best friend. Rather, his former best friend, as he was almost certain they would never speak again after what happened the previous night. At the very best it would be quite a while before they spoke. Maybe after she spent some time in Cairo and realized that she hated it, she'd think to call him and tell him he'd been correct in his predictions. Yeah—like that was going to happen.

With a heavy sigh, Castle shut the refrigerator door and walked instead to the pantry. He was sure he had a container of Oreos in there somewhere. Or perhaps something chocolate chip? As Kate was now a married woman for going on two hours, he was definitely in need of something chocolate. And, also, something alcoholic, but that would have to wait a little while; there was just something not right about cracking into hard liquor before five p.m. even if it did feel like nine to him.

Just as his fingertips were about to come in contact with the Oreo box, Castle heard the doorbell to his apartment ring. Grumbling, he turned and looked over his shoulder, as though he could use x-ray vision to see who was at his front door. As he was not Superman, he did not possess such abilities, but that was unfortunate; they would have been convenient at that particular moment. He was not expecting any guests and, quite frankly, was not in any mood for company.

He shut the pantry door and began shuffling through the kitchen towards the front hall. My god, why was walking so difficult? Oh, right, because he'd only had a few hours of fitful sleep the night before while trying to prop his six-foot-one frame in between two tiny chairs in the airport lounge. He'd had a another hour or so on the flight back, but most of his seven hour travel time was spent playing Monday morning quarterback with his plans from the prior three weeks.

What if he had just told her how he felt while they were still in New York? Would that have made a difference? If he said he loved her that night in the Hamptons when they were talking on the porch—would she have changed her mind then?

He would never know the answers to these questions; he'd simply have to find a way to live with the decisions he made. Part of him wanted to say that everything would be fine. He had dated plenty of women before realizing his feelings for Kate and he had been happy then. Thus, he would be happy again. The other part of him strongly disagreed with that, knowing that after loving Kate no woman would ever compare.

His thoughts still lost, he pulled open his door in a haze. His eyes barely registered the sight before him: a brunette woman with large hazel eyes, a stunning smile and, oddly, several bags of luggage. In fact, in his exhausted stupor, he only recognized her when she began to speak in an atypical frazzled and speedy manner.

"I'm so sorry, I really need to talk to you, but I really have to pee. The cab driver took the worst route back from the airport and—I'm sorry can I-?"

Castle stepped aside dumbly and let Kate into his apartment. "Yeah, yes of course…"

With a relieved smile, she sprinted past him and skidded into the nearby powder room. Castle stood for several moments in the entry way, the front door to his apartment hanging open, before he thought it might be a good idea to bring her luggage in from the hall lest it be in someone's way. He hauled in the large black canvas bag and its smaller twin and set them against the wall before shutting the door.

At that particular moment, Castle wasn't sure his brain was functioning at a high enough level to process what was happening. Kate was in his Manhattan apartment, not in the Fitzgerald country home in England. Kate was not, at present, in a honeymoon bed with her husband. Kate had a large amount of luggage. All these things jumbled together in his over-tired mind, but did not cohesively form together in any way.

A minute later, Kate stepped out of the bathroom, drying her hands on her jeans. With a sheepish expression, she looked at him. "Thanks. I, um, couldn't wait to see you so I just ran right off the plane and got into a cab."

"Oh…right…"

She took a step towards him. "I was trying to call you, but your phone was off. What…what time did you get back to New York? I mean, when did you leave London?"

"Not until this morning," he said, his voice a bit gravely. "I spent the night in the Virgin Atlantic lounge. I, ah, I couldn't be in the same house as…as…"

She nodded, guilty. "Right. Makes sense. I flew out this morning, too—guess we barely missed each other at the airport."

Castle nodded, his brain still struggling with reality. "What…what are you doing here?"

Kate, clearly the more alert of the two, stepped up beside him, her expression bright. "I came to apologize to you. What I said last night…I was stunned. And scared. And confused. And…a million different things but none of that gave me the right to be rude to you and I'm sorry for that."

The writer let her words process for a moment. "You flew three thousand miles to apologize to me?"

She laughed. "Well, that and to say that I hope that I didn't ruin our chance to be together. I hope it's not too late and that you'll reconsider especially since I kind of left William at the altar for you."

At the first mention of marriage, Castle began significantly more alert. "At-at the altar...you didn't…"

Kate held up her ring-free left hand. "No. And I guess technically I did not leave him at the altar. I told him last night—right after I found out you'd left for the airport."

Oh. Well. That was…interesting. And unexpected, very unexpected. Castle shook his head gently and took two steps away from her. "I…I thought you didn't want me."

Her heart swelling in her chest, Kate stepped up beside him, lifted her right arm and brushed her thumb over his cheek. "Oh Castle, no. The exact opposite, in fact. I was mad at you...but really I was mad at myself because I'd been waiting to hear you say those things for nearly a decade."

His eyes grew wide. "A decade? Since we met?" When she nodded his jaw dropped and he merely gaped at her for thirty seconds before proclaiming, "I…I had no idea."

"I know you didn't and that's why I was kind of mad at you and me."

Kate walked over to the nearby leather couch and sat down, resting her hands on her knees, preparing herself for her next confession. She didn't want to tell him—she really didn't. It felt silly and school girlish, but he deserved to know the truth; he deserved the full story. When he sat beside her, she glanced at him tentatively and saw his intent focus.

"For seven years I knew that if you ever showed any interest in me I would drop everything and go running to you because I was crazy, stupid in love with you. But then...on the flight to London I finally realized how tragic and pathetic I was being. If you didn't feel that way about me by then, you were never going to and I needed to move on."

Being hopelessly in love with her best friend was certainly not something Kate planned on. It just…happened. One night on their way home from a Mets game they stopped for some late night food, started laughing together and it just hit her like surfacing after a lengthy underwater swim. She loved him but he…well, he wasn't exactly in a place for a relationship. She didn't mind, though; they were friends and that was good enough—for the time being.

Sure, she dated, but every time he invited her to a book release party or to his mother's Christmas bash she secretly hoped that would be the night. That night would be the night Richard Castle kissed her and told her he'd never let her go. But…after years and years of waiting, it never happened.

Martha and Chet's wedding was a reminder to her that she too wanted to get married and have a family one day so she decided to use her semester in London as a reset button. No longer would she wait around just in case Castle changed his mind about her. She would move on and find a man who reciprocated her feelings. That was, after all, what she deserved. Though, as with everything, things had not exactly turned out as she planned.

"Of course, I didn't intend on finding William my third day in the UK, but I did and I thought...okay, this is me moving on. In hindsight I guess I was a little overzealous and stubborn about it."

"What else is new?"

She laughed and tucked her hair behind her ears, slightly embarrassed. "You were right, though; marrying him would have been a huge mistake...and I would have hated Cairo."

Castle leaned back against the couch processing the information he had just received. It certainly was a lot. The knowledge that Kate not only was open to the idea of dating him, but already loved him as well was wonderful if not completely shocking. On top of that, to find out she'd felt that way for _years_ well, he didn't know what to make of that. "Why didn't you say anything?"

"About loving you?" she asked; he nodded. "Because I figured you'd blow me off—you weren't exactly into serious relationships post The Gina Debacle."

Oh right. That. The timing made sense, too. The nuclear fallout from his breakup with Gina would have happened approximately seven years earlier. Kate probably didn't want to be the rebound girl and then he moved right into his playboy phase so…yeah, that made sense.

Looking over to his friend, Castle's brow wrinkled. "You didn't get married?" he asked, merely to confirm he hadn't been dreaming the previous ten minutes.

She smiled at him. "No."

"Wow. Hell of a weekend."

"Hell of a weekend," she echoed. They sat for several moments in silence before Kate turned to face her companion, picking nervously at the seam on her jeans. "So...are you going to kiss me or not?"

Castle sat up a bit straighter and almost laughed. When adding his shock on top of exhaustion he hadn't even thought about kissing her—how rude of him! (Also, a testament to just how exhausted his brain was.) "Oh god sorry. Yes...I—sorry. I was just kind of amazed because twenty minutes ago I kind of half expected to never see you again."

"Well," she said, leaning her body into his. "I'm right here."

"Yes," he sighed, leaning closer, "yes you are." With that, he closed his lips over her giving her a real, non-forced kiss for the very first time. Kate sunk her face into his and he felt her hand close around his forearm.

"Oh damn," he sighed out, not even realizing he'd spoken his thoughts aloud until he heard her chuckle softly. Unable to get enough of the luxurious feeling of her lips against his, Castle leaned in for another long kiss. When he pulled back, he felt as though his brain had even less functionality, but one shocking thought still managed to sneak through. "Seven years? Really? Seven years?"

"Why is that so hard to believe?"

"Because!" He stood from the couch from the force of his point. "Seven years! I mean, you didn't even show the slightest... there were definitely times I thought you couldn't stand me."

Kate stood and followed him into the hall. "Uh, because I couldn't. You can kind of be a jackass."

"Hey!"

She smirked. "Well you can." Then, softening her expression, she stepped up beside him. "But you can also be sweet and kind and wonderful. Like when you dedicate one of your books to me…and when you helped my father get into rehab because you saw how much he was hurting me."

Castle's eyes widened. "How long have you-"

She shook her head. "He just told me last night."

Castle swallowed hard. "Is that why you're here?"

"Yes. No. Learning that was the nudge I needed to let myself see all the beautiful, wonderful reasons you're in my life. All the reasons that would make me absolutely miserable if you went away. Like how you can make me laugh harder than anyone else. And how you have this sixth sense and always seem to show up with a cup of coffee for me when I need it most. And how for almost a decade you're the one person I knew I could count on, day or night, for whatever I needed. That's why I'm here right now."

Kate lifted her hands so that her palms rested against his chest. His arms snaked around her waist and she took a half step closer until their foreheads connected. Shaking her head ever so slightly she sighed, "Just...don't break my heart, Rick."

At the rawness and vulnerability in her tone, Castle squeezed her waist a little bit tighter. "I swear I will do everything in my power not to." This was it for him and he knew it. He had almost lost Kate Beckett once and he'd be damned if he let it happen a second time.

She opened her eyes, smiled gently and then gave him a kiss. He moved his hands from her waist to cup her jaw and stroke her cheeks gently with his thumbs.

"So," he began, gazing down at her as though she was an actual star that had fallen from the heavens. "What are you doing every night for the next week?"

Her brows arched. "Every night? Why Mr. Castle doesn't that go against one of your rules?"

A laugh escaped his lips. "Well, Ms. Beckett, with you I plan on breaking every single one of them."

She grinned even wider. "Perfect."

* * *

 _ **A/N** : First I want to thank everyone who reviewed at the end of chapter 9. Nearly 100 of you - that was quite overwhelming. I appreciate the kind words and those of you that said you understand my decision. And, as I said before, with some reviewers we'll just have to agree to disagree._

 _Also, thanks to those of you that made it through the entire story - I appreciate that. I hope you enjoyed it. For those familiar with the movie, I hope you enjoyed the mash-up._

 _Several of you asked and I tried to reply, but some were guest comments so I couldn't: I will not be posting the epilogue or the aforementioned sequel to this story on this site, but I might eventually post the epilogue on my tumblr._

 _Generally, this is where I tell you what's next, except there isn't anything. I will post the remaining 2 parts of "A Spark" but after that I'm going to take a little break._

 _It's clear from the events of posting this story and the associated comments that I need to take a step back and evaluate what I'm doing and why I'm doing it. You might get a couple one shots from me here and there, but as far as multi chapters I'm probably done for a while._

 _Thanks again for your reviews and follows; I appreciate them._


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